


A New Past

by Desert Dragonfly (bookbeachbunny)



Category: Agent Carter - Fandom, game of thrones, penny dreadful - Fandom
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-06
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-04-19 11:30:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 33
Words: 40,148
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4744688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookbeachbunny/pseuds/Desert%20Dragonfly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Crossover which posits Westeros having been part of our history. Mostly because I love Peggy and Catelyn (and the actresses that play them) this has been in my head for a while.<br/>Hydra is looking for the powerful weapons lost to time. Howard Stark has  away to beat them but when he goes back to the past he can't quite let a certain event play out like it did and that is going to create all kinds of trouble.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Beginnings

Chapter One

Peggy hadn’t had her head on her pillow for more than five minutes when the phone started ringing. She closed her eyes tighter moaned and tried to forget about it. The day had been so long already. There was so much going on.  
So much trouble.  
Her mind flashed on a thousand things and then some. But the phone didn’t let up in the least. “Oh come on!”  
“Hello?”  
“I need your help.”  
“Howard? It’s the middle of the night.” Peggy was very much up now. Practically the minute she had heard Howard’s voice and the words I need your help. Luckily she hadn’t bothered to do anything other than kick off her shoes. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”  
“Jarvis should be waiting downstairs.”  
“Of course.”

It was a mind-numbingly cold night in the city. Peggy bundled her coat even closer to her chest. Luckily Jarvis was indeed standing at his car waving to her.  
“Are you mad?”  
“What?”  
“You’ll be an icicle.”  
“I’m very good with the cold.”  
“I am not,” Peggy said happy he had left the heat running in the car. As Jarvis pulled out onto the street she noted that his hands were shaking just a little. Jarvis was usually unflappable. At least where Howard was concerned. “I’m almost afraid to ask. What’s he done now? And I sincerely hope you aren’t going to tell me this is about a woman.”  
“Well, yes.”  
“Turn the car around.”  
“Not in that way.”  
“Jarvis?”  
The streets were as empty as her stomach. Jarvis still took them slow and legally. She doubted he ever broke a law in his life. Even speeding. He managed a little smile, “You know how Hydra is looking for those swords?”  
“If they ever existed in the first place. Yes, they think they’re weapons. Howard hasn’t heard anything has he?”  
“No. No.”  
“Good.”  
“But he did have an idea actually he had been working on it for a while but he decided to take it for a test run tonight.”  
“What did he do?”  
“What would you do if you wanted to bend the reality of time itself? What would you do if you wanted to find something lost to time?”  
Peggy thought the car was freezing all the sudden despite the heat. “What has he done Jarvis?”

“I gave her a sleeping pill.”  
“Sir?”  
Peggy didn’t care for any of it. “I can’t believe it. Is this a joke Howard or is it actually true?”  
“You know my stuff always works.”  
“It always works badly.”  
“That hurts.”  
“It’s true,” Jarvis agreed with her. She was appreciative of that. But Howard was serious on this. “And I’m not sure it was a good idea to medicate her.”  
“We should probably immunize her. Who knows what she may catch from us?”  
“I need…” Peggy shook her head brown locks grazing her shoulders. “I’m going to lose my mind if you two keep it up! Jarvis! Howard… You actually created a time machine? Is that what happened?”  
“Not exactly. It’s more a time bender.”  
“A time bender?”  
“And space.”  
“Did you do it for Shield?”  
Howard faltered on that for a minute, “Yes!”  
“Really Mister Stark!”  
“I did!”  
“Enough! I want to see her.”  
“Are you sure? She was in a state already. She has calmed down but that’s probably because of the pills. That actress left them last month and you know actresses… they always get the best stuff.”  
“Howard?”  
“Yes?”  
“Shut up.” For once in his life he listened to her. Peggy threw up her hands and turned to Jarvis, “Take me to her.”

The red-headed woman looked up when Peggy entered the bedroom. Howard at least had given her a nice, and as far as she knew, usually unused room. She was so still though that it frightened Peggy until she walked a little bit closer. Peggy took a deep breath. The woman was a tiny thing under that old dress and her face was mostly hidden by long red curls. But Peggy could see she watched every move she made.  
“Hello… I’m Peggy Carter. Don’t be afraid.”  
“What happened to me?”  
“I can explain.”  
As close as she got to the woman she noticed for the first time there was blood on her dress not a small amount either. “My God! Are you okay? Was that Howard’s machine?”  
“They murdered my son!” the woman whispered. “Everyone was dead and the blood was tickling… It was everywhere!” She shook her head and somehow still curled up further in her small frame. “They were all dead.”  
“It’s okay.”  
“Are you Frey? Lannister?”  
Peggy shook her head. “I’m Peggy Carter. No one here is going to hurt you.” Mentally she told herself she’d make absolutely sure of that. She reached out attempting to put her hand on the woman’s to provide some sort of comfort but she flinched and pulled away. Peggy remembered her history lessons then and realized for the first time who she was talking to…  
A murdered son.  
Red hair.  
Frey.  
“They were going to kill me. I know it but that’s what I wanted. I had lost them all,” tears rolled down her cheeks. “I lost everyone.”  
“You’ll be safe here. Can I ask? Can I ask what your name is?”  
“Catelyn. Catelyn Tully Stark.”


	2. Bearings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catelyn begins to get her bearings and seeks answers from the past.

Bearings

Peggy sat with Catelyn Stark for hours trying to explain the impossible to her. She tried to listen to her explanations but after a while and after realizing that she wasn’t dying she had questions of her own to ask. “What do you know of my daughter Sansa?”  
“I…”  
“We still had hope to save her even though they married her to the Imp.”  
Peggy stroked her long red hair. She hadn’t convinced her to change out of the bloody clothes but she had managed to get her to the bed, cover her in a blanket and give her a pillow. The woman didn’t seem bothered right at the moment by the lights or all the other things that must have looked so strange.  
She didn’t know what to say. Peggy knew her history, knew that most of her children had actually (at least according to that history) lived fairly long and important lives. But they weren’t still alive and she had a feeling that was the only thing that would matter to her.  
She wondered if they could return Catelyn Stark back to her place in time. Back to her murder…  
“We’ll talk about them in the morning okay?”  
She was going to bludgeon Howard. Catelyn turned her head just a little and that was the first time she noticed the portrait of the naked blonde woman over the bed. It seemed to startle Catelyn even more than it annoyed Peggy.  
“Littlefinger!” Catelyn cried bolting up.  
“What? No!”  
“Are you one of his whores?”  
Peggy’s eyes went wide, “I assure you I am not!”  
After that it took another ten minutes to calm her down. Back in the hallway Peggy was so furious she knew why people punched walls or other people. Jarvis was walking toward her but he took one look said simply, “He’s waiting,” and scurried back to his room. Peggy felt the fire blaze up in her and took the stairs two at a time back to the study.  
“Are you mad?”  
“Do you know what you’ve done?” she yelled. “Why? What are we supposed to do now? This isn’t a character from history Howard!”  
“Actually…”  
“She’s an incredibly traumatized woman.”  
“I saved her!”  
“Howard!”  
Peggy had visions of grabbing him and beating sense into him. She doubted that would work though. Howard Stark didn’t do things by halves and she shouldn’t have doubted messing with history would be any different. She took a couple of steps away, a couple of deep breaths and attempted to regroup.  
“When you told us that you could find those swords before Hydra no one thought you meant something like this.”  
“You really should have. I mean come on Peggy! We’ve meet before haven’t we?”  
Nope, she was still dreaming about hitting him.  
“Why her?”  
“It was a test run.”  
“So that’s what you choose?”  
“I was there Peg. I saw it happening. What would you have done?”  
“Not been there in the first place. Not interfered with history. Take your pick!”  
“You’re no fun,” he pouted. “Drink?”  
“No.”  
“Look Peggy, you and I know this is not just about the swords. I made the impossible possible and now we can get everything.”  
“What are you talking about Howard?”  
“You don’t have to dig up half the world at large to look for relics if you can just go back in time and find them.”  
“Uh-huh.”  
He smiled at her, “It will be so easy!”  
“And why bring Catelyn Stark here?”  
“Tour guide?”  
“Howard! She was dead!”  
“Not yet,” Howard took another drink. “She deserved a little bit of kindness.”  
It was the way he said it that rang the bells. “Howard…”  
“What?”  
“You’re not serious!”  
“Not everyone can say they’ve slept with a historical figure.”  
“You slept with Joan of Arc last year.”  
Howard smiled at the memory. “Costumes don’t count.”  
“Since when?”  
“Since I made the impossible- possible.”

 

In the morning Jarvis did his usual routine. Peggy had stayed in one of the spare rooms so that if Howard started up his machine again she would be there to murder him. Jarvis could hear them bickering downstairs and wondered for the thousandth time how long they could potential go at it.  
“That we have a way!”  
“But we don’t Howard! Not to mention what they may do to her.”  
“You want to send her back?”  
“We’re going in circles!”  
“Believe it or not, I have a plan!”  
Jarvis rolled his eyes at the same time he heard Peggy chuff but then he gave up on them. He had no doubt that one day those two people who were so dear to him would do great and important things. If they could survive each other and themselves for the time being.  
So he made a huge and delicious breakfast set it up on a nice tray rather outdoing himself in the progress and walked to the guest room where he was surprised to find the bed empty. “Hello?”  
“Hello Lady Stark?”  
The last thing he wanted to do was terrify her but he didn’t want her wandering around without having any idea… Well, she wouldn’t really have any idea of anything would she? Jarvis knew that she had been the Lady of a great castle once but that had been almost a thousand years ago.He put the tray down and hurried out to start checking rooms. With the mood she was in Peggy was probably not going to take losing Catelyn Stark well.   
Jarvis was so relived to find her in the library that he actually laughed. “Thank heavens! I thought you had run away!”  
She was surrounded by books. On her lap there were two open books, one she was reading through and several on the floor at her feet and on the closest table. Jarvis walked a little bit closer and she finally looked up at him.  
“They’re gone. I mean I thought that before, I thought that before and I left them…” She looked up at him and Jarvis was surprised to realize that though she had obviously been crying but she managed to sound so strong and resolute he was impressed. “I left them twice now.”  
“It was a horrible cruel thing that happened to you.”  
“Really?” she raised an eyebrow. “That seems a little bit of an underestimate don’t you think?”  
Jarvis blinked a couple of times. “I simply do not know what else to say.”  
“Fair point.” She closed the books on her lap and set them aside.  
“If you want I made you a meal. You seem a little… Well, you probably haven’t eaten in a good long while.”  
“Your time or my time?”  
“Ma’am?”  
“You don’t have to call me that. I just want to know what I’m doing here and what do I have to do to have you send me back.”  
“Send you back?”  
“Yes. To whatever awaits me…”  
Jarvis thought not of the history books but of the horror stories that had been passed around and then through time about what might have awaited her. Looking at her standing in front of him brave and scared all at the same time he thought she deserved so much better and he certainly wasn’t going to tell her about that.  
“I’ll get Howard and Agent Carter.”  
“Wait!”  
“Yes?”  
“What’s your name?”  
“Jarvis.”  
“Of what House?”  
Once again he was at a loss for words. He was about to explain it to her- she seemed to be waiting for an explanation. “Let me get the others!” 

Catelyn stayed in the room. She wasn’t bothered by Jarvis. Her head was a mess regardless. She felt sometimes as though she couldn’t move thinking of Rob. Thinking of him stabbed and fallen. Dying...  
Bolton.  
Jaime Lannister.  
She turned away and reached for a book desperate to keep her mind off of it. The pain was so great it almost tore her in two. But if these people were telling the truth and she hadn’t lost her mind some magic had taken her far away and they were dead. Her family and her enemies.  
Horrible memories mixed with happy ones and she felt the tears. It was not blood. Not hers. The strange man had grabbed her right before a bolt had struck her. She turned another page and felt sick at a drawing marked “Tywin Lannister” staring back at her. The author had done an excellent job from what she could remember.  
I can fix it, Catelyn thought suddenly.  
I can stop it.  
Trying to calm herself she started reading the entry. “Some people still theorize that the great Lannister was a lawful neutral leader that he did the right thing by instigating the brutal slaying of the usurpers. The Red Wedding did after all end the war. Tywin Lannister just didn’t get to the long term goals he was hoping.”  
When Peggy came into the library Catelyn was ripping out the pages of the book one after the other.


	3. Enemies, Weapons and Pie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Peggy tries to explain things to Catelyn about Hydra's quest to find the famous weapons of the past and Catelyn realizes not all is lost.

“Call me Peggy.”  
“What does Agent mean?”  
“It means I work for the government.”  
“What King sits on the throne?”  
Peggy faltered. “I’ll explain that to you. Would you be okay getting out of here?”  
So she had given her a dress. Howard had several dresses in the house. Catelyn had heard them bickering about how disgusting that was but Catelyn rather liked the garment. It was a strange material but a lovely deep blue color and fit her very well. Even better it wasn’t covered with the blood of the North. Peggy even had shoes for her. She handed them to her with a smile, “Don’t ask where they came from.”  
“Why?”  
“You don’t want to know.”  
Catelyn had a hard time with the buttons and then running the brush through her hair but she had the feeling there was nothing like a ladies maid except the Englishman and that would have been odd. When her hair was finished she looked at herself in the mirror and for just a fleeting moment she felt like Catelyn again.  
That made her think of Ned and that strangled her heart.  
“Wow.”  
“Did I do it right?”  
Peggy smiled. “It suits you.”

The automobile had thrown her but she took a deep breath and carried on. She had the feeling this would be better than anything else that had happened to her recently. “Are we in the Reach?”  
“What? No. No… we actually are on an entirely different continent.”  
“Essos?”  
“No. No…”  
Catelyn turned and looked at the passing scenery. There was snow on the trees and she thought of Winterfell. She thought of home. Her children playing in the snow. There had been one snowball fight where she had taken a hit to the shoulder and turned around in such shock only to see a guilty looking Ned.  
“Did I hurt you?”  
She had gathered up the snow and threw it back so fast he hardly knew what hit him the children cheering the whole way.  
“Lady Stark?”  
“You can tell me Catelyn.”  
But not Cat.

She hadn’t expected the diner. Peggy was a lovely woman. She reminded her of… No, Catelyn realized she didn’t really remind her of anyone. The emptiness felt all encompassing. She felt lost.  
“Catelyn? Would you like a piece of pie?”  
She looked up at the smiling woman in the ridiculously small uniform waiting happily to, according to Peggy, take her order. Catelyn was back at the wedding in an instant. The food had been awful and she was starving. She was so hungry. Everything was a mess in her head. She tried to sort it. She had to be strong in order to figure this out and get home. “Yes, yes. Do you have lemon?”  
“Of course.”  
“Thank you.”  
Peggy had filled her in on the reasons the strange talkative dark-haired man had brought her back. But in bringing everything out the idea that bad people were looking for those old swords in order to find Valryia and Asshai Catelyn had realized there was something else. Something more painful.  
There was nothing left.  
“Why do they think the swords can help them? They were lost even in my time.”  
“Our enemies, Hydra. They look to collect great pieces of history. They believe those swords are important. There’s a working theory that it’s those three swords combined that will lead the way to old Valyria and some even believe as a matter of fact that they are made from the broken pieces of Lightbringer.”  
“We always believe a lot of nonsense don’t we?”  
Peggy smiled at that. “Well, the more I see of strange things these days the more I believe.”  
“What about Riverrun? You said that people had found the ruins,” she nearly choked on the word. “Of King’s Landing and the Stormlands but what about Riverrun?”  
Peggy shook her head.  
“And Winterfell?”  
“No. We’ve never found any of the places of the North. Not yet. But as far as we know we’re still doing better than Hydra.”  
“Why would you think that I could help you?”  
“I don’t know. Truth be told I didn’t know what Howard was doing period. He could be in a lot of trouble.”  
“And me?”  
“Don’t worry Catelyn. Howard can take care of himself and we’ll both look out for you.”  
“My husband had a great sword once but it was never returned. Do you know? Do you know if my family ever got it back?”  
“Lemon pie! Here you go!”  
“Thanks. Thanks…”  
They ate in silence for a moment. Catelyn trying to ignore the way Peggy kept staring at her. The Lannister’s had melted Ice down. She knew that much so if it had been some special sword it was quite destroyed at this point.  
“What did you want from me?”  
“I think Howard just wanted to save you.”  
Catelyn couldn’t understand why and she could barely think about something else she had been feeling. This little glimmer of fear at a whole new world. This little glimmer that maybe she was glad she was saved because she could go back. She could save her children. Her son.  
“I don’t understand. Besides these swords what do these Hydra people want with Valyria?”  
“They’re chasing weapons.”  
“Weapons? Let me guess. Dragons?”  
“Do you know in all the years we’ve never found a single one? Not a single solitary skeleton and we’ve found skeletons of the dinosaurs.”  
“The what?”  
Peggy shook her head, “Never mind.”  
“I saw them in King’s Landing. The skeletons weren’t very large though. I can’t believe Winterfell is lost…” she could picture it. So close and so real that she felt all she had to do was walk out the doors. “It was beautiful. It was my entire life.”  
“I’m so sorry.”  
“Blackfyre was taken across the sea, at least that’s what I was told growing up. Dark Sister…” she shook her head. “Maybe old Aemon Targaryen could have known something about that but I’m not sure. I never meet the man myself.”  
“It’s okay Catelyn. We’ll figure something out. I’ve always found that Howard’s meddling helps in all kinds of ways we never expect.”  
“Whatever happened to the dragon Queen? I only looked for my children in the history books. I should have…”  
“She died. She died in the battle of the Dawn on her black dragon.”  
“And the Lannister’s?”  
Peggy paused imagining that she was on thin ice here. “Cersei lived for many years after. They called her the mad Witch of the Rock though they say she held no power. She was killed by an assassin of lore called the Faceless Men.”  
“I’ve heard of them.”  
“Tyrion was King for a time though that ended quite badly. He was one of the very last Kings. Conflicting evidence of how he met his fate.”  
“Probably falling off a whore. The Kingslayer?”  
“He lived a good long life on Tarth with his Lady.”  
“So she betrayed me in the end.”  
“What?”  
“Never mind.”  
She wanted to ask about the bastard but couldn’t bring herself to. He had probably risen higher than any of them with her luck. She finished the pie. Pain had gotten the best of her for so long that anger seemed easy enough. She could feel it flowing through her when suddenly something crashed behind her and she was right back at the wedding. Smalljon in front of Rob throwing over a table. “No…”  
“Catelyn?”  
“No!”  
It was all silent to her. The noise had been deafening then but now in her head, and she knew this was in her head, it all played in a sick slow silence.  
“No!”  
“Catelyn! Look at me!”  
Peggy had reached over and taken her hands. Everyone was looking even the poor crying child who had thrown a fit when denied another desert. For a moment she was humiliated there was no reason to behave in such a manner. By the Mother she felt she would go mad.  
“Are you okay?”  
“Very much no. But I’ll do whatever I can to help you.”


	4. Interlude Part One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Howard wonders why no one thinks he's a genius and Vanessa Ives suffers strange dreams and weird connections.

Interlude

Howard Stark was unsettled.  
So he did what he always did when he was unsettled. He played with his machine. Though he wasn’t so engrossed not to notice Jarvis staring at him. “I’ve kept my promise to Peggy. I haven’t turned it on.” Jarvis took a few more steps into the room though he wouldn’t get any closer. “I also don’t need a lecture.”  
“I wasn’t going to lecture you.” Howard gave him a look and Jarvis managed a smile, “I’m sure you already know what I was going to say.”  
“You’re a brilliant man Howard Stark?”  
“You know what they say about history.”  
Howard raised a finger, “Those who don’t learn from it are doomed to repeat it. I can’t think of any better way to learn from it.”  
“You didn’t just step on a bug Sir.”  
Howard rolled his eyes.  
“You didn’t just kill the dinosaurs.”  
“We could go back and see the dinosaurs if you wanted. I’m willing… and I promise we won’t bring them back.”  
Jarvis didn’t bite.  
“You know that woman could very well be my great, great, great, well a lot of greats anyway, grandmother.”  
“I fail to see the resemblance.”  
Howard shrugged and kept on with the cleaning. He was doing it just to keep himself busy at this point. “I actually do have a plan here. Believe it or not.”  
“Since when?”  
“Since a couple of minutes ago. I’m just going to go back further!”  
“I’m surprised Sir.”  
“By my genius?”  
“No you’re wasting time with swords…”  
“And time machines!”  
“Hydra is digging up half the planet and oddly bringing all kinds of attention to themselves and yet it never crossed your mind to just go back to Valyria or Asshai and find what you’re looking for.”  
“Too dangerous,” Howard tried to cover but Jarvis could easily tell he had hit a nerve. “Mad men, magicians and dragons.”  
“And half-told legends.”   
“There’s truth in every legend.”  
“Sir?”  
Howard threw up his hands. He was getting to the end of the rope. Really, he thought someone ought to be congratulating him. This was life-changing, world-changing (hell, it had already changed history) and all anyone was doing was yelling at him. “You should see it Jarvis.”  
“What’s that Sir?”  
“History.”  
“I don’t know about you but I prefer to see a much nicer version of it.”  
“There aren’t versions of history Jarvis,” Howard corrected. “There’s only the truth and it’s never very nice.”

Southern France  
Daniel Murray was not really French though the fake accent was good and helped keep things moving and the Hydra money and kept him from getting into too much trouble when they dug way past what they had been told and kept digging. Daniel was tired. But he knew they were close.  
They pretty much had to be. The masters were getting tired of waiting.  
Daniel turned away and smiled at a tall and snake like looking man who had been standing alert behind him. For some reason he still insisted on wearing the Hydra uniform. He stood out like a sore thumb and he watched. He hadn’t stopped watching yet. “Alert your master. Tell him I believe we’ve found the Citadel. Treasures to come.”  
Snake Man just nodded, “He already knows.”  
“But I only just…”  
“He already knows.”  
“Okay then.”  
Below them deep in the dug trenches there were a few serious people still working at it. There was one older man in particular who had been dreaming of this since he was a child reading story books. He could care less about Hydra. He was in the dirt to learn. To discover great things.  
The assistant behind him very much wanted to be drinking with the others. Jack was just about to let him go to when he saw something bright protruding from the dirt. He couldn’t help himself.  
“James? Do you see that?”  
“What?”  
“Here…”  
“It’s a piece of glass Sir.”  
Suddenly Jack noticed that all noise had stopped from above. The temperature had dropped rather suddenly and James was yawning when he turned around.  
“Sir? Look!”  
It had been early evening just a moment before the sky had a pink tinge about it that seemed as though dawn was on the horizon.  
“How is that even? Did we sleep?”  
He was careful enough removing the dirt and the more and more he moved away the more he revealed what seemed to him a perfectly intact rather intoxicating candle. “Be careful!” he warned James though the other still wasn’t paying that much attention. “It’s glass.”  
Everything around him seemed to stop. He reached out to touch the thing and was sure he saw something.  
“Did you?”  
“What?”  
“There’s something…”  
“Careful!”  
James held it up and took in a deep breath. Somehow in the glass he was looking at someone else a ghostly looking woman with raven colored hair and sharp eyes slowly carefully brushing out her hair. James took a deep breath and though he told himself later he had imagined it he thought she looked right at him before disappearing from the glass.


	5. Interlude Part 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanessa realizes things could be worse. Cat, Howard and Peggy take an unexpected trip to the past.

Interludes Part 2

“What are you doing?”  
“I’m breaking it.”  
“Don’t!” Vanessa didn’t know why she took the small mirror away from Ethan. It was a trinket that meant nothing to her had in fact just scared her half to death but she didn’t want it destroyed. “I was startled but I suppose it’s not the worst thing in the world.”  
“You said someone was looking at you through the glass.”  
“I know. But he seemed harmless.”  
“Vanessa…”  
Things had been better recently. They had been settled. Ethan and Sir Malcolm were both back in her life and even Victor seemed to be doing better these days. Her dreams were admittedly a little strange but for Vanessa Ives they were better than usual.  
The man in the glass was new one though.  
She hadn’t yet told Ethan about the other thing either. The dragons. It made her nervous yes but sometimes dreams were dreams.  
“Vanessa?”  
“We’ll ask Victor to look at it. Perhaps I was just imagining the whole thing.”  
“At least let me take it.”  
She handed it over with some hesitance. Ethan was as good as his word, she had no doubt of that. Besides Vanessa couldn’t help but think the important part had already happened.  
She felt a connection that she couldn’t explain. She felt a connection that was somehow vast but also important. Somehow knowable to her.  
“You okay?”  
“Fine.” She wasn’t forcing the smile when she held up her hands and said, “Stranger things have happened to us right?”

“No.”  
Howard looked at her in amazement, “Why is that your favorite thing to say to me? You’re a rare bird Peggy Carter.”  
“Where is Catelyn?”  
“Upstairs. Jarvis is explaining the television to her. So far she’s not a fan. But she does love my library…”  
Peggy sighed and started cleaning up the Shield information she had brought him. While the Agency was in the new stages their informants were top notch. Hydra had discovered a site in France that they thought was most likely the Citadel and they were removing things.  
That was only one problem.  
She wasn’t about to tell him about the information out of Russia. Peggy looked at the strange machine that took up most of the center of the room and wondered how in the world so many people…  
She reached out and touched the metal edges and a shock went through her. It had crossed her mind what she could potentially do with a machine like this. Where she could go and who she could see…  
“Peggy?”  
“Hm?”  
“You want me to turn it on?”  
She snapped out of it then, “Absolutely not Howard!”  
“Don’t yell!”  
“Except I’m open to the possibility that it might be necessary.” Howard was about to smirk when she cut him off, “If only to send Lady Stark home.”  
“Oh Peg, can’t we keep her?”

Of the television Catelyn was interested if not completely fond, “Maybe I’ll learn to like it.”  
Jarvis managed a smile, “To be honest there’s not that much to like about it. Mostly very dull.”  
“My children would enjoy it.”  
“Yes…”  
“They’d fight over it like anything but they would enjoy it.”  
Jarvis left her not soon after that and she understood, she really did. Even before this strange dream no one had known what to say when she talked about her children. She walked over to the shelves again. Honestly Catelyn was still getting used to the dress and the bare legs but she had kicked off the shoes long ago. She was almost comfortable and it had been so very long since she was comfortable.  
She reached for a book with Valyrian writing on the spine when she looked up she caught a vision in a mirror.  
A ghastly woman with long white hair half falling off and red eyes. Catelyn let the book drop to the ground.  
It was her.  
It was her.  
The buzzing in her head almost stopped and she looked directly at the unmoving unseeing woman and she glanced down at herself and could see blood running like a river down her chest down her hands…

Vanessa woke managing not to scream. That would have brought the whole house down around her. Strangely enough the newest nightmare made her feel a little better for any child who knew their history and legend would have recognized the woman she just dreamed about.  
They still wrote penny dreadful’s of Lady Stoneheart and while Vanessa had always found the story to sad too bear she had heard it nonetheless. It was the other woman that she didn’t understand.  
Red hair.  
Blue eyes.  
High cheekbones.  
It could have been Catelyn Stark. That would make the most sense but Vanessa had never seen clothes like she was wearing and she could have sworn she saw light fixtures behind her.  
Wouldn’t Catelyn have had candles?

Catelyn didn’t sleep well that night but she didn’t cry either. She lay in her comfortable bed staring at the nice room around her and she thought for what had to be the millionth time of Ned.

“Take me back.”  
“What?” Howard had been pleasantly surprised to wake up and see her standing over him. He felt bad about it for a minute but he was still Howard Stark. Then he realized he had fallen asleep at his desk, his backed ached and he had promised Peggy not to touch the woman standing in front of him. “You do know what happens if I leave you there right?”  
“Not there.”  
“I can’t… I’m not exactly sure that I can…”  
“Why not?”  
“There’s this whole changing history thing that could possibly happen and I think that’s what you’re planning.”  
“I never said…”  
“No. No. I understand. I even admire the chutzpah.”  
“What?”  
Howard shook his head. “See, I don’t think bringing you here did anything to history because technically you, well…”  
“Died?”  
“I was going to put it more pleasantly. You exited the narrative so to speak.”  
“Well, put me back in it. Except take us to Valyria before the doom. Find out what you want and we can go from there.”  
“Yes, see. Even I know that’s a bad idea.”  
“Worse than what you’ve already done?”  
“A bunch of crazy blonde people with purple eyes…”  
“Exaggerations.”  
“In your time maybe.”  
Catelyn gave up at that and spun around approaching the machine. She had no idea what she was doing except the overwhelming desire to do something. She didn’t remember coming here but if this man had managed it then it probably wasn’t that hard to do.   
“Don’t!”  
“What?”  
“Don’t touch that!”  
“I’m only playing.”  
“With a time machine!”  
“Then show me what to do!”  
Howard was getting a little hot under the color. He didn’t like it when people touched his stuff but this woman seemed immune to any reason. Not that he had much reason.  
“Howard?”  
“Peggy, it’s not what it looks like!”  
“What?”  
The machine started all at once with a rumble that shook the whole of the mansion. Jarvis bolted straight up in his bed right out of sleep and rolled his eyes. Catelyn took a step back.  
“I didn’t…”  
“Turn it off!”  
“Thank you Peggy!”  
“How?” Catelyn asked.  
“Oh, now you don’t want to just hit buttons?”  
“Under the circumstances I don’t think that’s a good idea.”  
“Thanks.”  
“Howard!”  
Catelyn had gone to take one step down from the platform about the same moment Peggy had tried to get to the button and Howard had stepped up. They all collided into each other with the tremors from the machine and Howard was shoved forward right down onto the exactly wrong button.

Stars.  
Catelyn only saw stars.  
It felt as though she was being ripped forward and every instinct in her body was to run the opposite way. She thought she might have heard someone else screaming. Then she fought the urge to pass out. One thought ran through her head like no other. Please, please… if she opened her eyes at the Twins she knew all would be lost.

To Be Continued


	6. Dorne

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cat, Peggy and Howard arrive in Dorne while Vanessa wonders about the meaning of time.

Catelyn tasted sand.  
She groaned and flexed her fingers. Yep, sand. The cry of a bird startled her out of her pain and she jolted upright. Nothing but sand. She figured she had done this before and recognized the feeling. The nausea would pass. She had however lost the shoes Peggy had given her and her hair was a mess.  
Stupid things.  
She pulled her hands away from her hair and cursed herself for thinking about stupid things again.  
“Peggy? Peggy!”  
The other woman was lying twisted a good distance from her. Cat’s heart was in her mouth until she was close enough to realize she was still breathing. She didn’t even know how to check her to see if she was okay but breath was good. Breathing mattered.  
“This, this is why you don’t just touch buttons!”  
“Howard! Where are we?”  
“The operative question my dear is when are we?”  
Catelyn shook her head. He wasn’t any worse for the wear but she didn’t know yet if she could trust the man. “I wanted you to send me home.”  
“When. Not where.”  
“What?”  
“Never mind.”  
Peggy groaned and opened her eyes. She took in the two of them and then looked at the sky and made a face, “Please tell me that for whatever reason you decided to carry me outside.”  
“Yes,” Howard told her. “And then lost you in time. Good job Lady Stark!”  
“I was only trying to get you to send me home!”  
“Howard,” Peggy gripped Catelyn’s hand and pulled herself up into a sitting position. “How do we get back?”  
“Unless she did something I didn’t notice the machine had a sixty minute limit on early tests.”  
“It will bring us back?”  
“But I need to stay.”  
“You can’t!”  
“Why not?”  
“Besides the fact that we don’t even know where we are,” Howard sighed. “I’ll explain it later.”  
“Do you recognize this place?”  
Catelyn shook her head. “We aren’t in the North or the Riverlands I can assure you of that.”  
Howard was just about to say something when Catelyn saw a shadow and Peggy cried out. It was Catelyn that pushed him down stopping the bolt from going right into his head. She flashed back.  
Blood.  
Pain.  
The wedding…  
No, she pushed it out of her head.   
“Are you okay?” Peggy yelled but they were being surrounded by mounted riders all holding weapons. Sadly all three of them had seen enough death and destruction to know that they couldn’t fight even if they wanted to.  
“I know where we are…”  
“What? Catelyn!”  
“It’s okay!” She recognized the finery of the guards themselves and even though it had been years since she had reason to see Dornish soldiers. “I am Lady Catelyn Stark…”  
Howard groaned, “That might not be good.”  
“They won’t hurt me.”  
“Do you always think that? You are a first rate hostage you know!”  
“Howard!”  
“Just staying the obvious Peg.”  
“Lady Stark. So the stories aren’t true.”  
“Do you serve Prince Doran?”  
“Doran?”  
“Howard…”  
But he couldn’t contain his glee from the fact that it seemed like they were in Dorne and Howard had always imagined Dorne to be his kind of place. Not at the edge of a sword perhaps. The lead soldier gave an order and the weapons were put away as a couple swung down and bound their guest’s hands.  
“You really don’t…”  
“That’s not necessary!”  
“These are my companions! They’ve brought me here and we need Prince Doran’s help.”  
“We will let him decide then,” another soldier offered her a hand. Catelyn realized she wasn’t being bound but she acquiesced and mounted behind the soldier. Howard and Peggy rode bound together on a horse of their own while its previous rider joined another. A million thoughts ran through Cat’s mind as they made their way back carefully.  
If there were stories about her that could most likely mean her death. She had understood that much from the history books.  
She had died at the Twins.  
So they were still close to the right time. “Tell me, who sits on the Iron Throne?”  
“The Kraken.”  
“What?”  
At that news she nearly fell off the horse.

“Did you hear that?”  
“What?”  
“What he just told Catelyn?”  
“Please, I’m just hoping I get questioned by the Sand Snakes.”  
Peggy rolled her eyes. She remembered certain things although she had never really considered herself a student of history. The Kraken took the throne when he beat down a pretender. A pretender thought to be the nephew of the Prince whose daughter had died with him.   
“Relax Peggy, Doran Martell is a good man. He’s not going to harm us.”  
“Maybe not…”  
They did not have far to ride before they saw Sunspear. Even Howard was impressed when he saw it in the distance. It looked like it was a fantasy an illusion the heat bouncing off the castle. The air around it looked like glass. Everything looked like beautiful perfect glass and the spires of Sunspear rose to meet the sky.

Catelyn knew enough of grief to understand the silence of Sunspear. No one really looked at them as they entered the grounds.  
Empty faces.  
Empty eyes.  
“Hydra’s looking for weapons,” Howard told her before he and Peggy were lead away. “Get any information you can find.”  
“On weapons?”  
“On whatever.”  
“Howard! What if we’re separated at the end of the sixty minutes?”  
“She’ll come back as well.”  
“Are you sure?”   
Howard wasn’t but he had always found that projecting an air of confidence especially when you didn’t have any was especially helpful in calming people. “All three of us are ghosts in this time Peg. She’s already dead here. She goes back with us.”

 

“Voices?”  
“Yes. In movement,” Vanessa motioned with her hand her fingers mimicking, she imagined, three people running away. Ethan gave her a look. “I don’t think it’s the usual though.”  
“What do you think it is?”  
“It’s going to sound mad!”  
“Try me.”  
Vanessa realized that telling Ethan something would sound so mad that any of them would think it was mad was pretty crazy in and of itself. Normal people would have considered either one of them truly mad long ago. She took a deep breath. She had been hearing the same voices. Especially the two women.  
Backward.  
Forward.  
Backward.  
“I dreamed I held a bloody sword.”  
“That’s not what you were going to say.”  
“I think it’s time Ethan. This isn’t like normal. I think I am seeing people moving through time."  
“Isn’t everyone moving through time?”  
“Fair point. But not everyone’s going whatever way that want.”


	7. The Prince of Dorne

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cat meets with Prince Doran.

After being assured that her friends were fine Catelyn was given a small room in which too clean herself up. There was not overwhelmingly much to do. She found herself changed into typical Dornish dress – and she had to admit to herself she was enjoying the materials of the clothes recently.  
She had caught sight of herself in a piece of Dornish glass decorating the walls. She did not recognize the woman in the mirror in the brilliant blue dress with her hair out of its braids. She could almost convince herself Catelyn Stark was someone else and her life and pain belonged to someone else.   
Then she kicked herself for foolish thoughts when her family was in trouble and there was so much pain and suffering. Her children were still out there but she needed to keep herself together.  
The room was beautiful but Cat especially loved the huge open windows that looked out over the gardens. The lemon trees so high and so close she could have reached right out the window and touched them. She smiled at the thought of her daughter. Maybe one day Sansa could do well here and even this place would be alive with joy and light again.  
But for now she could not make herself comfortable. Catelyn tried to concentrate tried to think of what she knew of the Martell’s but they were part of a past that Ned never brought up.  
“Lady Stark, I’m Areo Hotah. I will take you to the Prince.”  
“Thank you.”

Peggy was pacing a room of her own. Her watch had stopped during the journey. Could she even think of this as a journey? She shivered and wondered if Catelyn was okay. Peggy was quite fond of the woman but she was an unknown factor. There were other unknown factors and her mind was currently running through all of them.  
“Howard?”  
“This place is amazing! If we can find it in real life I would be so rich.”  
“You already are.”  
“Richer. There are jewels in the wall Peg!”  
She forced herself to smile and decided they had enough problems to worry about. Besides she was a practical woman. She would not think of him now. She would not ask Howard why he hadn’t gone back to that time.  
“How much longer do you think?”  
“Thirty minutes maybe a little more or less.”  
“And if it doesn’t work?”  
Howard shrugged, “Then we better get used to relieving ourselves the old-fashioned way. Calm down Peg. It will work. Now the real question is do I have enough time to meet a snake.”  
“Is that the only thing you care about?”  
“I’d rather not be executed.”

Catelyn Stark was surprised by the man waiting for her in the lavishly appointed room. She had always heard Doran Martell described as a weak and silly man because he did not avenge his sister but one look at them man waiting for her in the wheelchair and she knew that was not true.   
He had a look in her eyes she felt in her heart. Doran Martell was a broken man. “Lady Stark. A pleasure.”  
She bowed and felt naked in this silly dress.   
“My pleasure. The rumors we had heard from the Riverlands… Well, you may still be a ghost but it’s good to see a friendly face nonetheless. Please.”  
When she took her seat she had a momentary need to adjust her dress like a silly little girl. This wasn’t a courtship but it got a smile out of the Prince nonetheless. A servant entered poured her a glass of wine and food was put out before her.  
“Thank you.”  
“What brings you to Dorne? I must tell you if you seek shelter you shall find it.”  
That made her blush. She had not expected kindness. Not anymore. “Thank you but my friends, well. It’s very hard to explain and sometimes I fear as though I cannot explain it myself. They helped me. They saved me. And now I’m trying to help them.”  
“Duty and honor. I suppose when the families dead that’s all that’s left.”  
“Prince Doran?”  
“I have nothing left either Lady Stark,” he brought the jeweled goblet up to his and drank deeply. Hotah watched them carefully from the Prince’s side but Catelyn didn’t believe she had anything at all to fear from him. So she reached across and put her hand on the Prince’s. He looked surprised at first but after a moment and without looking at her he took her hand in his and squeezed it.  
“How in the world did you escape? Ellaria told me that the original plan in King’s Landing was to take you prisoner.”  
“It is a story,” she shook her head. “I fear you would think me mad. They’re looking for swords though, well, anything of old Valyria. Dark Sister and Blackfyre. Do you know? I know your brother was in the Free Cities for a time. I’m sorry. The last thing I want is to upset you.” She knew that Oberyn had died in King’s Landing facing that creature of the Lannister’s. She could imagine all too what Doran felt. But she did not want to talk about or dwell on the Twins. Not now. Not ever.  
“You haven’t heard?”  
“No, I’m afraid not.” She had read certain things in the books in Howard’s library but her mind had been on her family as much as anything.   
“I don’t know if he was my nephew. My daughter believed it or she wanted to. Believed it right to her death.”  
“I’m sorry Doran.”  
“Arianne wrote me that he had a sword that sounded much like the Blackfyre sword. That’s not a good thing if you’re claiming to be a descendant of the legitimate Targaryen’s. If the sword was real I imagine they carted it off to King’s Landing.”  
“And the Kraken on the Iron Throne?”  
“The golden daughter of Tywin Lannister married the Crow’s Eye.”   
“Euron Greyjoy?” Catelyn’s head swam at the thought. Euron and Cersei. She imagined that to be a match that even the Stranger would have run away from. Actually, the thought of it made her want to laugh out loud. Perhaps they were both getting what they deserved. Doran shook his head. “I have people in King’s Landing but as you can imagine its madness.”  
“What of Tommen?”  
“Dead. Cersei herself claimed the throne over her daughter. My son Trystane is all that’s left.”  
“My Gods. Perhaps we are all cursed!”   
Doran looked up sharply at the thought and though it had slipped out and it was something she thought about herself often he looked so upset that she immediately wanted to take it back. She was about to apologize when he motioned to Hotah.  
“Lady Stark, can I show you something?”  
She didn’t know how much time she had left if Howard’s machine would even work at all but Hotah was already moving the Prince so she stood brushed out the dress and followed the Prince.


	8. Angel or Demon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catelyn visits a hidden tomb and Vanessa takes matter of time into her own hands.

They did not have to go far. She followed the Prince and his guard across the silent gardens and looked up at the sky. It was just getting dark and the way it colored the sky was beautiful. A full moon was already playing witness. Catelyn took a deep breath of fresh clean air there was no scent of blood to it and she realized her presence here and the fact that she could breath was a gift.   
It was magic.  
“Lady Catelyn?”  
“I’m sorry.”  
Doran shook his head and she wondered if he would ever have any peace again. “I think you are right. Oberyn could never let Elia go and in truth I was no better,” he talked of his anger and his misery as they walked around the temple he had led her to. Catelyn thought it a simple structure and if she remembered her history she this might be the temple of Daenerys the first.  
“We thought it was so simple what we wanted. Justice. Justice for Elia and her children. Justice for the many lost…”  
“It was all I wanted for my son.”  
And then, she realized, for her husband.   
For her daughters.  
For her boys.  
For Robb.  
“It seems so reasonable right?” They had walked through a covered back entrance. Catelyn was surprised and she felt a prickle of fear in her heart. “At the very least we wanted the people responsible to not be celebrated and admired throughout the land. Don’t be frightened…”  
She could see the tomb of Daenerys indeed but the way they had entered the temple left them off to the side.  
The entombed body of the woman rested under an open area of the temple. Catelyn looked up at the light and could see the moon above them. It was almost peaceful. She shivered at the thought of her resting place.  
“We are indeed surrounded by ghosts.”  
Hotah must have moved because the wall closest to them shifted away. Catelyn was stunned. She didn’t even see how that was possible. Doran sighed. “And now my children. My daughter. But perhaps Dorne’s ghosts go even further back.”  
“What is this place?”  
“A tomb built long ago.”  
Doran moved inside first and Catelyn appreciated that. She liked the Prince rather a great deal and the fear she had felt a minute before dissipated. When she stepped inside Hotah had lit a torch that waited and began to move carefully through the room. Now she understood why it was so large.  
The light was not good but it was well kept and the arches were strange and impressive…  
“Oh! Is this?”  
The fear came back to her then for if this really was what she thought she would be standing inside the bones, the body of a dragon. She found herself spinning around deeper into the room where there was another tomb. “My grandmother told me that they believed they laid her to rest at the heart of her dragon.”  
“Is that?”  
“Rhaenys Targaryen,” Doran said sadly. “We are surrounded by ghosts and drowning in blood.”  
“Why did you bring me here?”  
“Because I believe you when you said you are one.” Catelyn paused at the side of the tomb but Doran looked up at her and he actually smiled. It wasn’t much but he smiled at her and she relaxed. “You and your friends should go to King’s Landing quickly if the sword is there and that’s what you wish. I know it will not last much longer.”  
A shimmering light flashed in front of her eyes and startled she pulled her hands away from the edge of the tomb.  
Rhaenys seemed to be smiling up at her.   
“Two of the snakes are there I will try to send word to them but I don’t know if it will get through or how much time you have.”  
“Prince Doran…”  
Hotah moved toward her suddenly and in a way that startled her but Doran waved him off. When Catelyn went to hold her hands out to him she realized her hand was fading but Doran reached for her anyway.   
“Don’t be afraid.”  
“I’m not,” he was smiling again now. He made to move her hand but there wasn’t enough left.  
The light around her made it hard to see but she felt, she felt, his lips gently kiss her palm.  
“I’m sorry!”  
“Free us from our ghosts Lady Stark.”

Then she was gone again but this time Catelyn wasn’t afraid. She wondered if she would return to Peggy’s world. She could almost see them blurred in with the lights the colors of them.  
It was too much.  
It was watching the world rush past.  
Time.  
“Stop!”  
Catelyn nearly fell right over. She took a deep shuttering breath but this wasn’t right. There was a small dark room even with the windows there was nothing but candlelight that reflected in a mirror and there was something about the mirror that sung to her. It was in the mirror she noticed the woman and turned her head so they looked directly at each other. “I didn’t think that would work.”  
“Who are you?”  
The woman had long dark-hair and wore an even stranger dress with sharp green eyes. She was, unsettling.  
Catelyn felt herself being pulled forward again.  
“Angel or demon?”  
“What?”  
“Should I fear you?”  
The pull was getting worse but she couldn’t move. She glanced down and realized she was standing in what looked like a circle of blood and unfortunately she knew blood. “Please let me go!”  
“Did the devil send you? Is this a trick?”  
“I don’t know! But it’s hurting me!”  
The sound and the light was circling her in such a way that it actually felt like it was ripping her apart. The woman moved toward her. “Are you an angel or demon?”  
“Neither! Both! Please, let me go!”

Something in Vanessa snapped at that point and she hurried forward. Catelyn was in too much pain and she couldn’t see well enough to fear her. Vanessa used her foot to wipe away the blood and in an instant the red headed woman in the blue dress was gone from the room…  
The noise and light disappeared just as quickly.  
It was silent.  
But Vanessa Ives seemed to hear and see everything.

 

“What in the world was that? Do you know what I just saw?”  
Howard and Peggy both had this look on their face. She recognized it. It was like when her children were about to tell her that they had done something they shouldn’t have or when Ned told her he was going to war with Robert again and then brought home the Greyjoy boy.  
She pushed the green-eyed woman out of her mind. “What is it? What’s wrong?”


	9. Green Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Howard and Peggy receive information of a Hydra attack that forces their hands.

At this point with SHIELD still being relatively new it was housed in the basement of the Pentagon. Which wasn’t as bad as it sounded. The Pentagon was a big place. Even Howard was pleased with the digs. They did not think it was a good idea to take Catelyn Stark with them and even Howard was glad that they hadn’t when he saw the pictures and read through the sketchy reports.  
“There are some things I wish I didn’t have to see,” Peggy muttered.  
“I know.”  
Hydra had set off some sort of poison glass in the heart of London. At least seventy-one had died in a city still reeling and recovering from the war. At this point no one had any idea what the gas was.  
But it looked as though the people had burned from the inside out.   
“Spontaneous combustion?” Howard has asked.  
“It’s possible. They’re flying us a couple of the bodies.”  
While Howard had been briefed on the science of it, “It looked,” one witness said. “Like they were being consumed by green flames!” Peggy had heard about the politics and more important the theories.  
An old church in Southern France had been destroyed around the same time and the body of a small blonde man found. In the weeks prior locals had reported digging and Shield had been trying to get someone on the inside but hadn’t managed at the time of the explosion.  
The reports noted that trucks had been seen leaving the site the night of the explosion and the one man was the only body found.  
“Green fire? Could it be?”  
“The secrets of that died with the warlocks Howard. If it was ever real to begin with.”  
“How can you still doubt?”  
“The fact of history Howard has nothing to do with whether myth and legend was ever real.”  
But the reports had unsettled her even more than there little trip. Not to mention Catelyn had been going on about a woman she had meet. How do you meet someone while in the process of traveling through time?  
“What a mess.”  
“Yes.”  
She wanted to ask him why he hadn’t brought Steve back. It flashed through her mind but she pushed it out of her head. Howard had his reasons. Even if he didn’t understand them he had his reasons. Instead she turned to him and asked, “What is our goal here Howard?”  
“To stop the bad guys.”  
“How? It seems like what you’re saying is we should do something miraculous only to collect weapons and do what with them?”  
“Hide them.”  
“How? Why?”  
“Look the damage they’ve already caused Peg.”  
“We don’t know if that’s related.”  
“Related to what? Why are you arguing against this so hard? If Hydra can get their hands on the swords especially before we can find them or even find out who’s running the show, which we haven’t done yet I would like to point out, then it’s the belief that matters! People believe in the power and the history of those weapons!” he tossed the pictures down on the table.  
Peggy didn’t look away. She wasn’t the type.  
“They beat back Aegon’s forces outside of King’s Landing,” she finally said. “And his body was eventually taken into the city but no one knows what happened to the sword.”  
“Well, not now.”  
“Okay Howard.”  
“Really?”  
“We could try to get to Aegon first.”  
“Why?”  
“To take the sword Howard!”  
“Oh, sure. I thought you meant… never mind!”  
Peggy gave him a weird look but the fact of the matter was she was doing no real good here and the trip to Dorne- she hadn’t even really got to see anything but it had assuredly peaked her interest. “We’ll have to do a better job this time. The right clothes. The appropriate hair.”  
“Right. Right. Where would we get that?”  
“Costume shop?”

Catelyn was so engrossed in her drawing that she didn’t even look up when Jarvis sat down a saucer of tea.  
“Lovely.”  
“Oh, thank you! I’m sorry about the paper.”  
“No worries. One comes every day. Is that the woman you saw?”  
Considering it was done on top of the daily newspaper the drawing of Vanessa was very good. She had even colored in hair. Clothes. Eyes. But something about it unsettled her and she folded it up and reached for the tea. “Oh!”  
“Chai.”  
“What?”  
“That’s the tea. Chai. I thought you might like it. Agent Carter and Mister Stark should be back any minute…”  
“What?”  
“What?”  
“You called him… Howard’s last name is Stark?”  
Jarvis had never been much of a bluffer and he couldn’t hide the “oh dear me,” look on his face. Catelyn had only known him a couple of days and she could read it in his eyes. “Howard is a Stark? Is he? Are we relations?”  
“I, ah…”  
“Well?”  
“He likes to think so.”  
Peggy and Howard chose exactly that minute to burst into the library Howard practically in mid-sentence. “Catelyn. You’re going to go over everything the Prince of Dorne told you. We’re going back to King’s Landing tomorrow and try to get a hold of Aegon.” He only stopped when he saw the look on Catelyn’s face and the way she was glaring at him eyebrows raised and hands on hips. He looked between her and a guilty looking Jarvis and back to Catelyn.  
“What?”  
“You’re a Stark?”  
“Well, in a manner of speaking in 1951 I’m the Stark.” Neither Catelyn nor Peggy laughed at that and Jarvis just rolled his eyes. “We should get some sleep. Lots of things to do tomorrow!”  
“Are we related?”  
“I don’t know! I’ve never, I mean I’ve never traced it back that far. I like to think so. Maybe we could test…”  
“Howard!”  
“Yes, right. Yell at me when this is done grandmother!” he kissed her cheek smiled at them all and took his leave.


	10. King's Landing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catelyn, Howard and Peggy make their way in King's Landing at the worst possible time. Cat and Peggy see Sir Robert Strong in action.

King’s Landing had never been a favorite place of Catelyn’s and she liked it even less for the memories. The city was an absolute nightmare and the clothes Jarvis had found itched like mad. She led the way as best she could but it seemed like misery.   
And bells.  
Bells echoed through the air and her head. Howard stopped them for a minute to talk to a scrawny little boy. Even getting closer Catelyn could barely hear what they were saying over the sound of the bells and they still had to yell.  
“We were looking for the camp of Prince Aegon!”  
The boy just looked at them and then he pointed toward the city walls. Peggy gripped her hand before Catelyn could fall over. They were just heads on pikes on the city walls. She couldn’t even see them from so far below but it didn’t matter.   
Ned.  
This is what they had done to Ned.  
“You okay?” Peggy asked squeezing her hand but Catelyn could only nod.   
“So I miscalculated a bit,” Howard told them when he turned away. “Luckily we are in time for the wedding!”  
“Who’s wedding?”  
“Euron Greyjoy and Queen Cersei. The swords usually go to the victor’s right? So if anyone knows where it is that would probably be the so-called Kraken.”  
“He’s a mad man! He’ll kill us before he just hands over the Blackfyre sword.”  
“Let me worry about that. You just keep your hair covered and do some poking around. You know the players better than us.”  
“Howard?”  
“I’ll be fine. We’ll meet back here… How in the world did you people tell the time?”  
“The sky.”  
Howard rolled his eyes at her. “I’ll meet you back here when it’s dark and hope for the best in terms of timing right?”  
“Be careful Howard. This isn’t a game.”  
“Look at it this way Peg. As far as Hydra’s concerned we’re finally ahead, or behind. It really does depend on how you look at it.”

The warlocks that Euron Greyjoy traveled with marked their entrance into the city. A magic they couldn’t recognize, a strange smell in the air as though something grand had burned. It came to be understood among them that while that strangeness was in the city (and it wasn’t always) their powers were quite diminished. They saw it as nothing less than a murderous threat and set out to find the source and destroy it.

They had no luck the first day so that night they returned to their time. Jarvis had been watching the machine and researching more and more obscure books. Catelyn was impressed by what Howard could command. The second time they returned to the city it was only memorable because Greyjoy had gone out riding and Howard felt he could get a better look at his sword.  
“It’s his sword Howard. You can’t be sure…”  
“It’s a chance!”  
Catelyn kept her hair covered as best she could and tried not to let the memories get the best of her as they made their way through the city. Peggy let her do most of the talking here but the people were aggressive and frightened at the same time. When they did speak they whispered of demons and darkness.  
She felt as though she was in a dream. Every time she turned a corner she saw Ned. Every time the crowd parted.  
The people who worked in the castle had all but clammed up, as Jarvis would say. Catelyn rather liked the way her new friends talked. They were weird but honest enough. She did not feel as though they would stab her in the heart.  
Only once when talking with a fisherman that sold to the palace cooks did she sense a real shadow.  
Then she looked up and she saw him again.  
Ned.  
“Ned?”  
Peggy started at the name but Catelyn didn’t turn away. The vision of her husband smiled at her and then she followed his hand as he pointed up toward the palace. She could see the strange gray face watching the crowd. He was close enough that she could see the jewel doublet and a shiver of cold raced over her. Something in her reached out, grabbed Peggy and pulled her into the crowd.

Later they managed to find truly watered down drinks and sit on the steps of the grand sept. There was so much misery around them it was hard to think about anything else. “Did you see him?”  
When Peggy asked the question Catelyn knew exactly whom she was talking about. She took a sip of her drink and nodded. “I see him everywhere.”  
“I lost someone too. In the war. In our war…”  
“What was his name?”  
“Steve. I can show you we’ll he was very important to a lot of people. There were a lot of things written about him so if you wanted…”  
“I’d like that.”  
“It’s odd sometimes,” Peggy admitted. “To see those things. It’s having a piece of him but at the same time not. If that makes any sense… He belongs to history now and not just me.”  
“My husband died on these steps. I understand.” She thought of her children too. Still out there.  
She wondered if she found them, if she interfered with things now, would that change their fate.  
Catelyn didn’t want to think about her children or Ned. She was supposed to be dead but instead she was very much alive and she had done and seen some amazing things. “Maybe we’re tilting at the wind here.”  
“Excuse me?”  
Catelyn blushed. “It’s something I heard Mister Jarvis say to Howard. Did I use it the wrong way?”  
“No,” Peggy smiled at her. “You used it fine. This drink is dreadful.”  
“Yes. Doran told me that he had people inside of King’s Landing.”  
“Yes, I know from history there was at least one snake with the little Princess.”  
“Why aren’t we trying to find her?”  
Peggy nodded, “You’d think Howard would have thought of that one.”

Suddenly they were interrupted by a scream. It cut through the air but was followed immediately by several others and then a crowd of people rushing from in the direction of the palace.  
“Oh dear!”  
“What’s going on?”  
“Do you think its Howard?”  
“God, I hope not!”  
Peggy grabbed her hand and carefully they made their way toward the commotion. It probably wasn’t the brightest idea but they weren’t the only ones gathering. People were yelling, screaming, cheering as a great beast of a thing made mincemeat out of several men.  
It was disgusting.  
“Ugh!”  
“What is that?”  
Peggy felt herself go cold despite the heat of the day. “I believe that most likely, most unfortunately, is Sir Robert Strong.”


	11. The Queen and the Spider

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cersei and Varys see a ghost in King's Landing while Peggy and Catelyn meet the true guardian of the city.

“Mother!”  
“Mother, what is it?”  
Myrcella was not particularly fond of the woman that was clutching at her and hugging her all the sudden. She made a face at Nymeria who only shrugged. Cersei had come screaming into the room for a daughter she hadn’t bothered with in months. Myrcella felt tears on her bare shoulders and her mother gripped her face tightly when she tried to pull away. “Oh my dear! My dear!”  
“What?”  
“Have you been out into the streets?”  
“You know that I…”  
“Have you seen her?” Cersei screamed as though she could barely stand it anymore and then Myrcella found herself once more suffocating in her mother’s embrace. Since her return to King’s Landing she had been little more than a prisoner. When Tommen had died the poor little fool she thought at least she would be Queen but her mother had other plans.  
The only people left were jailers, spies and backstabbers, or people who simply had no other options. Myrcella didn’t even mind the theft of her throne. You couldn’t miss what you never had of course. Besides Nymeria often reminded her that her very life was in danger every moment she remained. But the Sand Snake had promised she would help her.  
Myrcella missed her freedom.  
She missed Dorne.  
The last time she had seen her blue-lipped fool of a stepfather, whom didn’t terrify her so much as the fact that he was the King and had her people’s lives in his hands, he had talked about marrying her to an Ironborn. She told Nymeria she would drink poison before she married any Ironborn and thought her old friend looked guilty at the mention but put that out of her mind.   
“Mother! What is wrong?”  
“She’s here! She’s come back from the dead! They’ve seen her in the streets!”  
“Who?”  
“Catelyn Stark.”  
“Mother…”  
Myrcella thought her mother was going mad. Sometimes she wished she would just finish her descent. She had enough real enemies she did not understand why she had to make up ghosts.  
“She didn’t get her daughter back so she’s come to kill mine! But I won’t let her love, I won’t let her…”

Howard was finally having luck. He had tried it first with one of the bonny maids of the palace but then he had found himself face to face with her father. A situation that was helped when Howard offered him his Rolex. It didn’t work and the man didn’t know what it was but it was shiny enough.  
The man had smiled at him and offered him a drink.  
It wasn’t long before they were having fun. “They’re mad! You don’t want in the palace!”  
“I do!”  
“No!”  
“I kind of have to!”  
“You must be mad!”  
“You could say that. Did you fight in the war?”  
The man’s eyes had darkened. “You say that like its ended. There’s still more to come and you and me both know it. You know when I was born they called me Rhaeger.”  
“Good name.”  
“Then he died so I was called Robert.”  
“Also…”  
“Thank the seven I was too old for her to change it again!”  
Howard didn’t quite know what to say to that so he patted the man on the shoulder, “Have you seen a sword?”   
“I’ve seen a thousand!”  
“I’m a little drunk.”  
“What?”  
“Never mind. I’d like to meet the King. I’ll make it worth your while!”  
The man looked at him and shook his head as though he was a mad man. Even his daughter laughed, “No one wants to meet him. Of course I would say the Queen’s scarier still.”  
“I love a scary woman. Can you get me in?”  
“Are you going to kill them?”  
“I’m not planning on it.”  
“Then you are not the answer to our prayers.”  
“I never am.”

Catelyn wasn’t happy waiting for Howard that night. They were getting nearer and nearer to the palace. They hadn’t had any luck in days but tonight it felt different. There was a prickling of fear she couldn’t help it. The sun was setting and people were clearing away. Hopefully they would make it back before the church bells rung.  
Something rubbed up against her legs and was startled by the ugliest, oldest looking cat she had ever seen.  
“Oh! Aren’t you a sweetie!”  
“I think, I wonder…”  
“What?”  
The cat was enjoying the kindness the two women were giving him. Peggy reached over and carefully rubbed under his chin. “I wonder if it’s Balerion.”  
“That old thing!”  
Catelyn had what was left of the small lunches Jarvis packed them every morning and she reached into her hidden pockets to pass that to the cat. He looked at her with such heartbreaking big eyes. Strangely they reminded her of Arya. She was just thinking that when he grabbed the food and bolted back toward the Red Keep.  
“You’re welcome!”  
“I think he liked you.”  
Catelyn couldn’t help smile.   
“Ladies! Guess who finally has a date inside the palace tomorrow?”  
“Really Howard, took you long enough!”  
“Great work doing whatever you we’re doing Peggy.”  
“We we’re gathering information.”  
“And what may that be?”  
Catelyn just sighed all the good happy cat feelings disappearing with a headache, “You two fight like my children. We saw Robert Strong.”  
“And Margery Tyrell’s trial starts in two days.”  
“She loses that trial,” Howard said pointing out the painfully obvious. “I can’t believe they even bothered at that point. This point. Whatever.”  
“We need to hurry.”  
“And be careful.”  
“That too…”  
They walked into the shadow of the Red Keep and disappeared but they had been noticed this time by the warlock watching them and by sad little man in the woman’s dress. The Spider had lost everything and had currently been using his little birds to monitor the situation inside the palace when they fell into his lap. He recognized the woman at once even though it seemed impossible.  
You couldn’t hide that red hair.  
At first he thought he was dreaming her but he had been following them for two days and had been close enough to hear her speak.  
For the first time since Aegon fell the Spider felt back in the game. If nothing else he could use Catelyn Stark’s reappearance to drive Cersei right over the edge. Ha! It was such a lovely thought he giggled out loud and then slipped back into the shadows and the streets of King’s Landing.


	12. Warlocks and Witches

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jarvis meets a new friend while Cat, Howard and Peggy run into big trouble in King's Landing.

After the last couple of days back and forth Jarvis was finally getting used to the workings of the machine. Howard had given him a couple of run downs and generally was very pleased with the way Jarvis was running it.  
“I’m not running it Sir. It’s running itself.”  
“Well, good job with not getting in the way!”  
Every time it did run it shook the mansion with a jolt that set his teeth on edge. So when one of the specially made Howard Stark security sensors went off it didn’t do anything to help. He grabbed a flashlight and walked out the relevant quadrant.  
Nothing.  
There was a slight breeze but he walked around the garden for a little while sure that it had just been a cat or some such thing. “You’re imaging things you. And now you’re talking with yourself alone in the dark… Oh dear.”  
But he was worried nonetheless. Mister Stark had been robbed before and that had caused all kinds of trouble. Howard got around that by stating most of his inventions were kept at Shield though they all knew better.Probably the bad guys did to. Jarvis had seen the pictures of the green fire victims.  
The house shook and the flash of light told him his friends were back and that at least made him feel better. He stopped one more time before hurrying back into the mansion. “Hello?” he waved the light again and there was nothing. He’d have to let Howard and Peggy know. Mentally he hurried back running over the endless list of precautions in his head.  
“I think that you should know…”  
The scene in the lab was a shock to say the least. The machine was on there was no doubt about that but no Howard, Peggy or Catelyn. If he had been paying attention perhaps he would have realized it was too silent for any of them. Instead there was a woman standing in front of him and in front of the machine like she had just come right through it.   
He recognized her at once from the portrait Catelyn had drawn.  
“Hello.”  
“Hello.”  
There were weapons kept in the lab, besides Howard’s actual experiments, but Jarvis wouldn’t use them. Besides it looked as though he could see right through this woman. Like she was more a ghost than a visitor.  
Jarvis just stood there staring at her for the longest time. Finally she smiled at him, “Can you tell me where I am?”  
“You are, you are…”  
He took in her dress.  
“Well, you are in the United States. We aren’t that far from New York if you know the area.”  
“Only by name.”  
“How? How did you get here?”  
“I walked into the light.” Oh, dear. Once again Jarvis found himself at a loss for words. “I’m Vanessa Ives.”  
“Jarvis.”  
“Just Jarvis?”   
“Yes.”  
It struck him then that by the light she must have meant the machine. Howard would have to explain that later but the machine was only supposed to be opened to Howard’s pre-programmed time period and only when it was supposed to. That meant if this woman was here his friends should have arrived as well.  
“Oh, no.”  
“What year is this?”  
“I think you might need to move out of the way or and I don’t mean to be rude, go back home. Because I’m expecting…”  
“What year is this? What is this?”  
“1951. Could you please step away from the machine?”  
“The machine…?”  
“How did you open it?”  
“Blood.”  
“Oh.”

Back in her own room the spell laid out before her the air wafting with incense Vanessa Ives lay unconscious on the the floor surrounded by light. 

“Howard? What’s happening?”  
“I don’t know!”  
“Is it the right time?” Catelyn asked. They had ducked down a side alley by the sept at the appointed time but nothing had happened. The machine had seemingly left them all right in the middle of King’s Landing. “Maybe we’re a little off…”  
“I don’t think so.”  
Howard and Peggy argued for a minute while Catelyn tried to think of ways out of this. She could not think of a single one. The machine had always worked. Though she supposed if she was left in this time it would be easier for her than her friends…   
“If the machine doesn’t open now what happens Howard? Can Jarvis fix it?”  
Cat noted that the streets even outside of the alley were emptier than usual at the moment. As near as they had been able to tell the Sparrows still had control over the Sept. Though it had been noted the Kraken was mostly letting them think that. There wasn’t even anyone around begging which had helped them immensely but now she was beginning to worry.  
“I think it would work something like a failsafe. I have a failsafe!”  
“Of course you do. Mind sharing it with us?”  
“If we were to miss the machine at any point in time we’d have a forty-eight hour window. It will, it should open one more time, and no Jarvis can’t technically work it but…”  
Catelyn didn’t hear what he had to say because he didn’t get the chance. The warlock came out of nowhere and caught her around the neck. She gasped as it lifted her off her feet.  
“Cat!”  
With a flick of the warlock’s hand Peggy went flying backward slamming into Howard. Catelyn had never seen one up close. Even in her time they had been the stuff of legends. Old Nan used to tell the children stories but in the moment she couldn’t remember any of them. It held her close to its stinking face and growled, “You aren’t dead! But you reek of magic!”  
Cat got it together long enough to give the thing a hard kick to its leg and it dropped her just in time to turn around and catch a bolt in mid-air.  
She heard it hiss and something snap when the bolt hit the ground by her in pieces. Peggy reached out and grabbed her and Howard made to move but Catelyn waved them off. “Don’t! We can’t win!”  
So she was surprised when the warlock disappeared as quickly as he had appeared.   
“Someone shot at it,” Howard said.  
“We have bigger problems than that. He mentioned that I reeked of magic. We are probably disturbing something even if we can’t see it…” Cat took a deep breath. “And he knew I should be dead.”  
“You think he knows who you are?”  
“I don’t know how that’s possible.”  
From her hiding place high up in the sept Tyene Sand put her weapon back in its place. The High Sparrow wouldn’t exactly keep with poison bolts after all and hurriedly slipped out. She could see in the distance trouble was coming. 

“Oh no!”  
Peggy had just pulled Catelyn back up when she saw them coming. They surrounded them quickly kicking up dirt and sand swords out and at the ready. Kings Guard. Lannister guard. Catelyn recognized them all. They got them all in a circle hands up back to back. “I’m sorry Cat.”  
“Why?”  
Peggy wasn’t blinking. “I’m better in my own time.”  
“This is my time and once again I’m hopelessly out maneuvered.”  
“Oh, you two are sweet but do you really think this is a problem?”  
“Howard?”  
The guard cut away and a generally large guy came forward. Cat didn’t recognize him from any time in the past. He wore the King’s Guard colors though and she hoped that would be a good thing. It wasn’t Robert Strong at least. Howard smiled, “This is the kind of thing I excel at!”  
“What’s that?” Cat asked.  
He smiled brightly at the man in charge, “Take me to your leader!”  
“Howard…” Peggy groaned  
The man didn’t so much as crack a smile.   
“The King? The Queen even?”  
“Howard, shut-up!”  
“Escort them to the dungeons!”  
Cat felt her heart sink. Ned had been in the dungeons before his death. Of course she thought just as quickly Tyrion had escaped from them by all accounts.   
“One moment please Sir Cleos!”   
An old man had appeared coming out of the Sept with a couple of young acolytes by his side. He seemed more than a little sure of himself and smiled at the guards as though they were the least important thing in the world. As though he could be the one to hurt them. All things considered Cat was impressed.  
“We’re on business for the crown! These are our prisoners!”  
“You wouldn’t know what to do with them!”  
“The Queen wants them!”  
Catelyn felt her heart sink at that one. If she saw Cersei… If she got close enough she didn’t know if she’d be able to stop.   
“She can see them in my care…”  
The Sparrows had actually knocked the guards out of the way and were taking them into custody. Catelyn didn’t understand a lot of stuff about the new King’s Landing but the fact that the palace seemed to have limited control even with the Kraken in charge was a very strange thing to her. “And what do you plan to do with them old man?”  
“Isn’t it obvious? I plan to try them for witchcraft.”


	13. Cersei

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catelyn meets Cersei Lannister again. Jarvis flees. Howard bribes a Kraken.

This time when he heard the noise from upstairs Jarvis knew he wasn’t imagining things. He was still arguing with the strange woman who had taken to wandering around the room picking up random things but when the indoor sensors went off even Vanessa was startled.  
“What was that?”  
“You have to go back! Listen!”  
“Is someone here?”  
Jarvis could hear them upstairs. He knew they were searching the place and while the lab was kept secret it wasn't impossible to find and he didn’t have a lot of time. Yet you can’t exactly grab a corporal woman. “Can you stop my friends?”  
“What?”  
“Go!”  
Vanessa looked startled enough to finally begin moving back to the machine. “Come with me! You’re in trouble!”  
“I have to stay here! Can you stop my friends? You’ve said you heard them and saw them moving through time…”  
“So that’s what they’re doing?”  
“Yes and if I don’t get out of here they may be stuck.”  
“Come with me.”  
Jarvis shook his head. “Then they’ll be stuck for a lot longer. Tell Howard…”  
“Who?”  
An explosion from upstairs startled them both. They were well-protected enough that it only sounded like a thud but Howard knew it meant trouble. “It’s important that you stop them! If they don’t destroy the machine they’ll be walking right into a trap.”  
“What about you?”  
“I’ll be fine. There’s always a back-up plan. You and I will likely talk again.”  
“Mister Jarvis?”  
“Yes?”  
“What is this strange magic?”  
Howard thought that much like Catelyn Stark she could handle whatever he told her. In large part because she had handled this so well already. But they were getting closer and that was making him nervous. “It’s a war Miss Ives. One that may become far worse than we ever imagined.”  
“I’ll find your friends.”  
“Thank you!”  
He waited until she had disappeared and counted to three. The machine did as it was supposed to, in fact in this case, it did exactly what Jarvis wanted and shut itself off. Then he reached for the heaviest thing he could find- a huge paperweight made of real gold that Howard had brought back from the war. Jarvis had found it completely over the top but it was the best thing he could find to destroy the machine.  
Then he slipped out through the passage that a couple of years ago had been used to steal other inventions from Howard. Stark had kept because, as he put it, “You never know when a get-away might be useful.”

Vanessa woke in her room as the light faded. Ethan was pounding on the locked door. At first she thought it was just a dream. That she had imagined the whole thing but then Vanessa thought about all the other things she had imagined and realized that the impossible was really the most likely thing.  
Period.  
“Ethan?”  
“Are you okay? I was getting ready to break the door down!”  
“I could tell. Malcolm would have been furious by the way,” she slipped back into her room and let him follow her. “I’m going to need your help.”

At least she was not in the dungeons in the Red Keep. Catelyn paced her tiny wet cell grateful for that. She probably wouldn’t have been able to deal with it for a minute. She didn’t know how much time had passed but guards had come for Howard earlier promising his, “Meeting with the King! Good luck to you…”  
“I never need it.”  
She had watched from the tiny little opening in the door. She and Peggy could talk to each other but at that point there wasn't much to say. If something happened to Howard then they had no idea if they could ever go back.   
She was surprised and worried when she heard the keys turning in the door. On instinct she moved to the far wall unsure if she could even fight her way out. She might have been unsure but as long as she was alive she had a chance to help her children.  
She felt the heat and anger rising when the familiar form walked in. Her hair had been cut and she looked as though she had plenty of her own problems but Catelyn couldn’t feel sorry for her. She wouldn’t.  
Those eyes had never changed despite everything. They were cold and mean. And they looked at her as though she was the lowliest creature on the planet. Cat hated to admit it but she felt fear. At her sides her hands clenched reflexively into fists.  
“So you aren’t dead,” Cersei Lannister snarled. “What a shame.”  
Catelyn thought of Ned and wondered again what part Cersei had played in that. She thought of Arya lost and on her own even as the Queen lied about it. She thought of Sansa and the stories she had told the ones she had read in Howard’s book. The anger left her then and it was nothing but rage. She took two steps forward and slapped the Queen hard across her face.  
Cersei fell back against the wall with a look of fury on her face.  
“That was for my girls!”  
“How dare you lay your hands on me!”  
Catelyn laughed and then she belted her in the nose breaking it easily. “That was for my husband!”  
The guards were already pulling the screaming bleeding Queen out of the room but Catelyn could hear her the whole way. “I want her dead! You kill her! If you don’t kill her I’ll do it myself! You’ll be with your family soon enough you bitch!”  
Catelyn was trembling when she was locked back in the room. That had probably accomplished nothing, nothing at all. But she couldn’t stop smiling.

Howard Stark had an audience with the King.  
“I’m told you have a proposition for me.”  
“You know what that is?”  
Euron Greyjoy gave him a strange look. Howard didn’t find him all that intimidating. The blue lips after all had turned out to be a bit of an exaggeration. Still he wouldn’t want to go one on one in a fight with him. The man looked as though he had stared into the face of madness itself.  
And laughed at it.   
“Where’s the Iron Throne? I’ve come along way after all…”  
“Do you want to sit in it?”  
Howard raised an eyebrow, “I can do that?”  
“No.”  
“Ah, well. Let me put it like this Crow’s… I mean your Majesty. The crown is broke. The war has taxed the land and you need something good old Howard…” he stopped himself at the last minute thinking the last name might not be such a great idea. “Good old Howard can provide!”  
“What’s that?”  
“Money.”  
Greyjoy had been cracking nuts at the time.   
“I have lots of it. Lots and lots of it.”  
“What do you want in return?”  
“There’s the rub. I want my friends and I to be freed from those lovely little accommodations we were given. Not to be ungrateful it’s just I’m used to bigger rooms.”  
“What else?”  
“A sword.”  
“You want a sword?”  
Howard realized then that Euron Greyjoy had warlocks and even beyond Aegon’s sword perhaps that could be helpful in procuring the weapons. He took a chance and walked over next to the King patting his shoulder with a smile. Euron gave him a dirty look and Howard pulled away. “I think you and I could be great friends.”  
“Yes?”  
“We have a lot of the same interests.”  
“What’s that?”  
“Weapons, money and women.”  
“Sit down. Have a nut with me.”


	14. The Quiet City

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A quiet night in King's Landing as the city ticks down it's final moments.

Cersei Lannister was not happy.  
Qyburn pronounced her nose a clean break, “It will heal my Queen.”  
“Can you hear that?”  
“What?”  
“In the walls.”  
But the minute the old man seemed to be listening the noise stopped. He turned away and Cersei heard it again. She pushed him aside and made for the walls around her. Qyburn was talking but underneath and behind the walls she could hear only one thing. Laughter. She put her ear against the wall and listened.  
"Tommen?" she whispered suddenly. "Is that you?"  
Qyburn watched her sadly but didn't say anything.   
Catelyn Stark back from the dead.  
Tyrion.  
She closed her eyes and she could see him waddling through the walls with a knife in hand laughing, laughing.  
“I know your there!”  
"My Queen?"  
It was just her and the old man again. Inside the walls a couple of Varys little birds scattered away. They came every day at odd times to drive the Queen over the edge. But all they did was scratch and move. The laughter. That was all her.  
Cersei caught herself then. She still had moments where she knew better. Qyburn was giving her a strange look and she wrapped a shawl around her shoulders and walked over to the window. It was cold today. The weather seemed to be moving back and forth between the two extremes. Same as her moods and her sanity. “Any news of Jaime?”  
“No, my Queen.”  
“Qyburn?”  
“Yes?”  
Cersei hated this city more than she could ever put to words. Even now when she should have been on top of the world it was suffocating her. It wrapped around her teaming with her enemies and it wouldn’t let up. She could feel it stealing the breath from her lungs…  
“My Queen?”  
“Send him tonight.”  
“But the trial?”  
“The Queen of Thornes will conspire to get the little whore off if she hasn’t already. You send him. While he’s there tell him Catelyn Stark and her friends as well. Understood?”  
“I understand.”  
Qyburn smiled as he left her. He did so love it when his creature got to work. He had only gone a couple of feet however when he realized that his hand was shaking, badly. The Queen was unsettling him more and more. She was beginning to frighten him and few things ever frightened Qyburn.

Back in Hydra’s headquarters the rats were scurrying around testing everything they had found at the Citadel site before they had destroyed it. Jackson Diller knew they weren’t having much luck and considering the message he had just received to take to the boss he thought he might need a vacation if he survived.  
“Ah, Diller. Any luck?”  
“No.”  
“With anything?”  
Diller nodded his head. Once upon a time he had been a war hero but that was a long time ago. You back the wrong horse and getting off the track means getting trampled. He knew he wasn't getting out of this alive. Diller himself was generally a big intimidating guy but the man across the desk with the missing eye and the cigar always hanging lightly even when he spoke... He intimidated even Diller. "They think the machine is salvageable. We could get it up and running."  
The Baron leaned back and lit a cigar. He took Diller in. He himself was an inscrutable man. You never saw the violence coming and though he was small his face was tinged from the experiments he had conducted on people during the war. The rumors were he did commit the worst of atrocities on himself hoping that it would make him better, faster and stronger.  
But that he had done it to himself didn't make it less upsetting.  
“Howard Stark is probably dead in history somewhere. If not yet he very well may soon be,” the Baron smiled at the thought. “Would you go through?"  
"Sir?"  
"Would you go through this machine if you had the chance?"  
"Yes."  
Diller thought he was smart enough to realize that he wouldn't really have a choice. The Baron nodded at him again and took a drag from his cigar. "You may just get your chance. Imagine what we could do with it."  
"We could bring back the dragons."  
He smiled at Diller, "Kill our enemies in their cribs. Let me know when it's ready."  
"Yes, Sir!"  
Happy that he wasn't killed for the other perceived failures Diller hurried from the room. He didn't see the dark-haired woman step out of the shadows and wrap her arms around the Baron. No one had seen her enter the compound at all but they usually didn't. Shield knew her as the Viper.  
No one else could have told you her real name. "You're losing your touch," she cooed. "The fool expected you to slit his throat where he stood."  
“I'm trying to keep up morale. These fools need to get the stuff to work before we can start testing it on them don’t you think? If only everything was as simple as the wildfire. That just worked on its own!”  
The Viper rolled her pretty blue eyes. "They just don't make weapons of mass destruction like they used to."

The sun set early in King’s Landing that night. It was oddly quiet and peaceful. There was something in the air that no one could quite put a finger on. A tremor, a spark, a fear that something was going to happen. People rushed home, if they were lucky enough to still have family to be with, and the gates of the city were closed as they had been every night since the wars began.  
They were closed.  
They were bared.  
It was not an unusual or strange thing of course but if you heard them that night and survived it you would always tell people that it sounded unusual. The noise echoed in way that it never had before. Cat heard one of the gates close from her cell in the Sept. Howard wasn’t back yet but at least Peggy was still present.  
They hadn’t yet disappeared and when the gates closed and the noise startled her she felt her heart beat even faster. It sounded around the city like it was the echo of heavy doors closing shut on a tomb and after that noise the city seemed to become even quieter.

“My Lady,” she did not recognize the name of the ladies maid that entered. Myrcella knew she had come from the Iron Islands and knew she was a bed warmer to many of Euron’s men. There was a bright bruise blooming on her cheek and she felt bad about not knowing the girl’s name. “I’m here to take you to your father.”  
Myrcella felt a chill go through her. "My father is dead."  
But the woman wasn’t bothered. She meet the Princess’ gaze dead on. “The King would like a word. I’m here to take you to him.”  
“Very well.” She did not like the sound of that but Nymeria had left her for a couple of hours and Myrcella would not show him fear regardless. “Take me to him.”

“Nym, is that you?”  
“Of course.”  
She stepped out of the shadows and tried to ignore the smile on Willas’ face when he saw her. He reached his hand out for her but she took a step back and shook her head. “Don’t. We have other problems.”  
“Nym?”  
“You have to leave with your sister tonight Willas and you have to take the other prisoners with her.”  
“I won’t leave you here!”  
“Come on, no one will suspect me of helping you. But we should hurry. Since they arrested Catelyn Stark I’m afraid the Queen is going to do something drastic.”  
“How do you know?”  
“I had word from Doran that she’d be coming,” she had grabbed his hand long enough to begin to lead him through the dark streets. “They want the Blackfyre sword.”  
“What for?”  
“He was less than forthcoming on that one. I have to get back. I'm worried for the girl.”  
"Why?"  
Nymeria gave him a warning look. They had talked about it before. How many things they both regretted that had so much to do with decisions other people had made. She found she no longer wanted harm to come to the girl just because of who her parents were. Willas knew better than to argue with her. He nodded his head and this time she leaned forward and kissed him.  
“I’ll get Margery out of the city and come back for you Nym.” She took a step backward. “We’ll see each other again.”  
“Take my sister to. And be careful!"  
He called out that he loved her one last time but she was already making her way through the shadows and back to the palace. Willas wasn't even sure that she heard him.


	15. Ser Robert Strong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ser Robert Strong attacks. On the Queen's orders King's Landing begins to burn.

Cat heard the screaming.  
At first it seemed like it was coming from outside the sept but she couldn’t reach the tiny little window that would have given her a better view and very quickly she heard the screaming from inside as well.  
“Peggy?”  
“I hear it to.”  
“What in the seven hells?”  
Peggy not only heard the screaming if she listened closely enough she could hear sounds of a struggle. Suddenly something slammed into a nearby wall and then there was silence. “Peggy?”  
She wracked her brains for the history of it all but as far as she had remembered there was no written attack on the Sept of Baelor. It was pretty simple really. Cersei burned the city to the ground after her daughter was killed and that hadn’t happened yet.   
“Margery?” Catelyn called.  
The girl hadn’t made a sound since they had been tossed in adjoining cells.   
“Margery Tyrell?”  
“I don’t know what it is!” her throaty broken voice called out at last.   
Suddenly the outer door burst open and a young sparrow came running in. Catelyn stood on her toes and could see. They had keys! She opened Peggy’s door first and then Catelyn’s. “We have to hurry!”  
“Who are you?”  
There was no answer as the body of another sparrow came flying through the same way the first had arrived. It was broken in horrible ways his eyes had completely popped out of his head. Catelyn almost screamed when it hit the ground near her. Tyene Sand tossed her the keys. “Get the Rose girl! I’ll distract him!”  
She had just moved for Margery’s cell not having time to note the thick Dornish accent on the man who was actually a woman when Robert Strong lumbered into view wearing full armor. Time itself seemed to stop as he stared them down. Tyene had pulled two long sharp knives from under her robe and ran for him.  
Cat and Peggy both watched with shock as the Knight roared and swung for her but Tyene avoided his trunk of an arm the first time and managed to plunge a knife into his side. He let out of a roar but there seemed to be absolutely no other consequence. She did an impressive spin and stabbed him in the back while he lunged for her again.  
“He can’t see!”  
Peggy nodded at her. “Get the girl!” She ran back into the cell and grabbed the wooden chair and broke the leg off. It was the only weapon she could find but it would have to make due.   
He might not have been able to see but he was enormous and finally was able to grab Tyene just as the keys managed to click in the door to Margery's cell.  
The girl screamed in pain as he broke her arm in one swift move. Peggy ran up while he was distracted and stabbed the wood into his knee.  
“Margery! Margery! Come on!”  
The girl was not the same as the one she had meet at Renly’s camp a lifetime and a half ago. She was huddled in the corner, eyes closed, a mess who looked like she had aged twenty years since then. Well, Cat supposed, she was about fifteen hundred or so years old but this was not the time. She grabbed the girl and pulled her up.  
“We have to go! Get it together!”  
She pulled Margery back into the hall just in time to see the Knight reach out and grab Peggy by the shoulder. Cat acted on instinct doing the only thing she could think even as Margery got it together enough to try to stop her. She raced forward and leapt on his back digging her claws into his neck. She felt like a fly but at least he let go of Peggy.  
After that things happened very quickly Cat was able to get a hold of enough of the helm right before he tossed her off him. It was at an odd angle however and she got lucky Tyene tried to break her fall. That didn’t really help but then Margery broke Tyene’s so that probably saved them all. At the moment she saw stars she realized she still held the helmet.  
“What in the name of the seven?” a male voice asked.  
“Willas!”  
The creature that had been known as Robert Strong stood in the middle of the room flailing about angrily lashing out at any sound. It barely missed Willas who was too stunned to do anything at all even though he had drawn his sword. Cat’s eyes adjusted. The stars disappeared anyway and she saw what everyone was so bothered by.  
The thing had a head that was completely wrong for the body and worse than that looked sewed on its skin a gruesome mottled shade it’s eyes were completely black. “The stories were true!” Peggy gasped.  
“What stories?”  
There was no time to answer however...  
Quietly as they could one at a time they ducked under him getting past the Mountain to Willas. Tyene Sand’s arm was hanging at a bad angle but her face was full of fury. “That lying bitch!”  
“What?”  
“The Queen,” Peggy whispered. “There were rumors and stories for years that Robert Strong was actually a reanimated version of the Mountain.”  
“Reanimated? How can you bring the dead back to life?”  
Peggy faltered at that thinking about the stories about Catelyn Stark. But they didn’t get any further away because at that point the Mountain creature reached out and grabbed Willas pulling him right off his feet and slamming him into the nearest wall even as his sister screamed.

The Spider had planned for everything.  
He was rather enjoying himself for the first time in a long time. It was a strange night but strange meant empty and left alone and he was happy enough at that. What more could you want? He was surprised to walk back into his small rooms and see a couple of his birds standing looking at him with pale and guilty faces.  
“What are you cretins doing?”  
“Oh, they came with me!”  
The dark-haired man was sitting in a small chair by the window. Varys eyes nearly dropped out of his head.  
“Nice sword.”  
“Who are you?”  
“Howard Stark.”  
“Stark?”  
“Yes, yes. You won’t know me from genealogy lessons. I told Peggy this would be a piece of cake! Okay, so the arrest was a little upsetting and the fact that we might be stuck here…”  
The birds twittered though noiseless because they were missing their tongues. Varys didn’t care. The man had found the sword.  
He had found him!  
“I meet a King tonight! Then I got stinking drunk with him and bought him off well, at least I promised to buy him off but hey, he probably can’t hold me to that. Then I found some of the little birds…”  
“Found?”  
“Yes.” Howard got right in the bald man’s face. “I took a chance. It did help knowing where to look. Didn’t think you were still alive though.”  
“Who are you?”  
“Someone who knows his history.”

The first of the wildfire exploded out of the ground nearest the East Gate. It wasn’t long before the fires raced through that part of King’s Landing and the screaming. The screaming was endless. The little birds saw it first outside the window.  
Then screams on the wind.  
Howard picked up the sword and followed them outside. “No…”  
“What has she done?” Varys cried. The sky over the city was already so bright with fire it could have been day. People were running toward the middle of the city. Behind them there was another explosion. Varys dropped his head into his hands. “She’s burning it down! She’s burning it down!” But when he lifted his head up again the little birds were gone and the strange man was running toward the Sept with Aegon’s sword.


	16. The Burning of King's Landing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> King's Landing burns as the characters try to escape their fate.

Inside when she realized what had happened Tyene let out a scream of rage and ran for the Mountain distracting him long enough that he didn’t crush Willas. Unfortunately he grabbed her again and twisted her around. The other knife dropped out of her hand as he broke that arm. Willas managed to grab the knife from the floor and stab the creature through the knee with it.  
“Peggy!” Catelyn cried.  
“I don’t know… I don’t know…”  
The bells from the Sept started ringing then and the Mountain picked Willas up and threw him at Tyene. Margery was screaming again but Catelyn thought all the noise was just running together. The Mountain picked up his great sword and Cat realized with horror he was moving toward Margery who was standing behind her and Peggy.  
“Run Catelyn!”  
“I won’t leave you like this! You should run!”  
“I don’t think I can beat him,” Peggy shook her head.  
“No one can.”  
Suddenly there was a animal cry from above them and Cat looked up just in time to see a ball of fur go flying toward the Mountain. The cat landed on what was left of his face and though his eyes might have been useless he could, apparently, still feel pain because Balerion dug his claws in and the Mountain bellowed and that gave Tyene time. She buried the knife deep into the back of the creature’s neck and yelled, “For my father!”   
Gregor let out one long roar and tossed the poor cat whom Catelyn managed to catch even though it clawed a couple of deep scratches across her cheek and drew blood. Tyene didn’t even have time to pull out the knife. She had done her damage even with her arm broken and the other hanging from an angle out of the socket.  
Gregor Clegane went down with barely a sound and this time he didn’t get back up.  
Cat took a deep breath even Margery had stopped screaming. “Good boy,” she told Balerion rubbing the cat between his ears. Howard chose that moment to race back into the fray.  
“Come on!”  
“Howard! The Mountain…”  
“You found the sword!” Catelyn cried.  
“We really got to go!”  
Margery moved toward her brother and Catelyn kept hold of the cat all while trying to help Tyene. It seemed in the silence of the room for the first time they could hear what was going on outside. Cat’s eyes went wide and she looked to the high window Balerion had managed to sneak through. “What?”  
The sky was green.  
“She’s burning it down,” Howard said. “She’s burning the city down now and she’s barred all the gates!”

“Mother!”  
“Mother! Stop!”  
But Cersei wasn’t about to stop pulling her daughter along the walls. She had one escaped route planned and they were already wasting time. The fires had burned worse and faster than she would have thought and Myrcella was constantly dragging at her crying. “Mother, all these people need help!”  
“No, they don’t darling. I promise you they’ll be fine.”  
“Mother!”  
Cersei hadn’t entirely thought everything through. Most people made for the gates of course and died at them but plenty of people were at the water. She could see the rocks and the shore streaming with screaming, fighting people and she was tired of Myrcella dragging at her. With a blaze of fury she realized the ships, her ship, couldn’t come in any closer.  
Cersei took in the scene completely ignoring the death and destruction she had left behind her.  
Small ships were being overturned with people trying to make it to safety.  
They were going to overtake all the ships that had been put out. Though a couple of the fools were actually trying to rescue people. “Myrcella we’re going to have to swim. Understand love?”  
“What about the city?”  
“The city is gone. Nothing here will hurt us anymore. Euron is gone…” Cersei couldn’t help smile at the thought. Some Kraken. She had killed him and the whore she had caught in his bed. He had been so stunned her barely had time to raise his hand to her. She felt her face flush. One good memory of King’s Landing to take with her. Oh, perhaps the fact she had been slowly poisoning him for a time helped a lot as well. Cersei still saw it as a win.  
Myrcella took a step away from her. “Mother? What did you do?”  
“Don’t be upset love, all our enemies…”  
“What did you do?”  
Cersei smiled at her ignoring the madness and chaos around them and pulled her daughter by the shoulder. “I did what no one else would! Even my father didn’t have the courage… We’ve defeated them all Myrcella!”  
“We’ve defeated no one! Do you hear that? That’s the sound of people dying!”  
“But it won’t be you and I love.”  
Once again though the Queen didn’t see the most obvious of things and while she was pulling Myrcella along they ran right into a group of people trying desperately to escape. Cersei’s cloak had fallen and the Queen was recognized at once one old man pointing her and her daughter out to the crowd.  
“You!” he bellowed.  
“You did this!”  
“No…”

Tyene had lead them down to the dungeons under the red keep. There the sounds of the city burning down was muted but not gone completely in fact Catelyn wondered if this was where she was going to be buried when what had to have been a huge structure crashed above them. At the door Tyene had tried to go back.  
“My sister!”  
“You can’t help her!” Margery had yelled. The girl, Catelyn noted, was quickly coming back to herself.  
They heard someone yell that the west gates were open but there was so much madness that Cat didn’t think it would help anyone. Willas shook his head at Tyene. “I’ll go for Nymeria. You’re too badly injured!”  
“No!”  
“Margery! It will be fine.” He pulled his sister close and gave her a tight hug. Cat remembered that in Howard’s books the Tyrell brothers had lived and been good friends with her children later in life. There had even been talk of Sansa and Willas being something more but she realized that was contingent on a different history.  
She held Balerion closer to her- he was actually a sweet creature.   
Cersei had burned the city earlier. They had changed things.  
But Willas had already disappeared and Howard was pulling them down into the darkness with Tyene promising she could lead them out on the other side. “It was the plan for you,” she told Margery. “Your brothers never planned to let you die here.”  
The girl was wept next to her. Margery Tyrell might have been young but Catelyn realized she knew what was lost and what was going to be lost. They hurried the rest of the way through the tunnels trying not to think of the burning city.

The Queen fought her way through the attackers at first with pure rage but Myrcella had tried to run the other way and away from her mother she was cornered once again by the walls of the palace.   
She thought the palace itself was probably burning at this point. “Little princess,” the angry man said and two others joined him. “My father died for your abomination of a brother! Now I’ll send you to him…”  
“Please!”  
He had just grabbed her by the hair when she saw the bolt explode through his chest. Myrcella couldn’t scream as the second one was dropped his last standing friend got a knife around her neck and pulled her upward wrenching her back hard enough that she felt the pain rip through her and then she was looking at Nymeria who had a dagger drawn and bloody from the other man’s chest. “Let her go.”  
“She deserves to die just like the rest of us!”  
“Maybe even more!” Nymeria said.  
Myrcella felt the blade bite into her neck and told herself she wouldn’t scream. In a flash Nym threw the dagger and though it was barely an inch away from her face Myrcella didn’t flinch. It went right through the man’s eye so suddenly and so quickly that she found herself falling with him.  
“Nym!”  
The Sand Snake was faster she reached out and caught the girl just before she fell down the steps.  
“Thank you!”  
“You’re fine…”  
“Thank you! Thank you!”  
“Come on, we’ll find a boat…” Nymeria didn’t get out another word before a sword sliced through her back. This time Myrcella did scream as she saw the shock on her friends face. The man had come out of nowhere.  
Nymeria found the strength to grab him before he could reach the Princess and then they all stumbled down the stairs toward the shore.


	17. City of Ash

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Survivors the burning of the city and Catelyn, Howard and Peggy worry about how they might have changed the past.

The city was gone by the first light of the morning. It was actually hard to tell that it was morning considering the smoke that filled the sky. Nymeria had died a little before that hidden with the Princess between some of the large rocks that lined the shore.   
She had confessed about Tommen and Myrcella had forgiven her. The truth had hurt but she wanted her friend to go in peace. She admitted to herself that deep down she understood the hatred that had driven this whole mess.  
“You should go home…” Nymeria had to her.  
“I don’t know anything about the rock. My cousins, they’ll be better off there than I am.”  
“That’s not the home I meant.”  
The Princess had caught her breath at the thought. To go back to Dorne would be like a dream come true so much so that she couldn’t even let herself think of it. “There’s nothing for me there.”  
“You know that’s not true.”  
They hadn’t spoken much after that and Nymeria passed away in her arms. Myrcella had seen enough death but the loss hurt her nonetheless. She closed the Sand Snakes eyes and wished she were with her father and her cousins once again.  
After there was nothing to do but crawl out from the rocks and make her way back. The city was not quiet even now. Myrcella walked along the shore and through the dead. She could hear moans and sobs sometimes even screams. A few random ghosts here and there that looked like shadows covered in ash.  
She found her mother lying on the shore surrounded by the bodies of other people who didn’t make it. Myrcella pulled her away. It looked as though the Queen had fallen from the low walls perhaps. After all the fighting she could barely find a mark or a wound on the woman. Cersei looked up at the sky and her daughter was pleased to see that she looked, for the first time in Myrcella’s life, as though she might actually be at peace.  
“Princess?”  
“Willas?” She was so stunned to see him standing in front of her that she simply threw her arms around him. But neither one of them could cry. He patted her gently on the back and pulled her away. “Come. They’re waiting for us.”  
Myrcella didn’t even ask who was waiting for them. She just nodded and fell into step next to him.  
“I’m going to go back to Dorne.”  
“I’m sure we can find you safe passage.”  
“Nym, she didn’t…”  
“I don’t want to know.”  
She understood that he already did. Looking around at the destruction and the fact that he looked as though he had been in a war she knew she didn't have to explain anything to him.

“This isn’t right,” Catelyn said. “Cersei burned it to soon. Was this because of us Howard? Was it something we did?”  
“I don’t know. But keep your voice down!”  
They sat in light and clear air having emerged at the place where Margery was supposed to have been saved without any trouble. The girl waited for her brothers as Tyene still waited for her sister. They at the very least had Dorne and Highgarden to go back to.  
Balerion hadn’t gone far. It seemed as though he had adopted Catelyn. She was mostly worried about what they might have done. Howard had explained to her that taking her before she died was one thing. It didn't change anything because she was still dead in her time. But this... Cersei had acted to soon and Catelyn couldn't imagine the consequences. She couldn't let herself think that they might effect her children as well.  
If they had changed history then it was possible that they had changed her children’s fate. How would she even know if they couldn’t get back? Howard had told them that he was sure forty-eight hours hadn’t passed yet but then he had also told them that the first machine might be a loss. “The first machine?” Peggy had yelled.  
“Voices.”  
“No one cares about us Howard!”  
“At least you still have the sword,” Catelyn pointed out. “So not all is lost. I’m not sure what we’re supposed to do with it…” Cat reached down to pick up her new friend. It happened all of the sudden. They didn’t realize it but more than a thousand years into the future Hydra had accidentally activated Howard's old machine.  
They disappeared into thin air taking the sword, the cat and the sound of Margery Tyrell screaming into the light with them.

 

Varys looked around the city in shock. It was gone all of it. The city that should have been his…  
She had burned it down.  
He looked down at his hands which where covered in ash and soot and he looked up at what was left of the Red Keep. The sky had a strange green tint to it that morning that would last for days. He almost smiled. He thought for a minute if only Littlefinger were around they might even have a good laugh like old friends.  
For Varys had finally won.  
He was King of a city of ashes.


	18. A Meeting Between New Friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Howard, Peggy and Cat meet Ethan and Vanessa. Jarvis travels and Hydra considers changing course.

It seemed weird that safety could be chaos but Catelyn had felt this before- and sure enough they came to a sudden stop in the middle of a darkened room. Howard just had time to drop the sword. “What the hell?”  
“Don’t be frightened!” the strange woman told them with her hands up. But the dark-haired man who was with her had pulled a weapon on Howard, who had paused halfway to reaching for the sword, he looked rather frightened himself. “Ethan, put the gun down!”  
“Do you see that weapon?”  
“Don’t shot.”  
“I agree with your friend.”   
“Howard…”  
“I know her,” Catelyn said. “I know this woman. This is the woman I told you about the last time we came back.”  
“Oh! Then you’re the one screwing with my machine!”  
“I had to,” Vanessa told him. She was the one who reached down and picked up the heavy sword as though it didn’t bother in the least. “You’re in trouble.”  
“It’s Howard,” Peggy told her. “We know this just by being with him.”  
Suddenly the pull of the machine stopped and the light died around them. Catelyn had time traveled enough at this point to realize that the machine had been shut down. There was silence and a light breeze from the open windows.  
“It’s for the best.”  
“What did you do to Jarvis?”  
“I didn’t do anything to him. I walked through the light when it opened and found him on the other side. I was assured it wasn’t any kind of afterlife.”  
“Howard? What happened?”  
He just shrugged. He went to take back the sword but Vanessa pulled away and Ethan raised his gun again. “I think our friend here probably got in the way. What happened to Jarvis?”  
“Someone was in your house…”  
“Mansion.”  
“Howard!” Peggy and Catelyn both snapped in unison.   
“He said he could get away and that you had a backup.”  
“Hydra?” Cat asked.  
“Has to be.”  
“Could have been Shield?”   
“Shield wouldn’t raid me,” Howard reminded Peggy and then reconsidered. “Shield better not ever raid me. This would have been about two days ago right?”  
“Yes, he told me to stop you. To warn you.”  
“Well, that could have been Jarvis on the backup.”  
“Not in two days,” Howard muttered.  
“If he’s even alive,” Peggy sounded so upset that Cat reached out and took her hand. The other woman was grateful for the touch and managed a smile.   
“He’s alive. But it’s going to take a couple more days… How did you get us here?”  
“I didn’t. I waited for the light.”  
“Can they do it again?” Cat asked having a worried idea of what he was thinking. “The last time she did this it pulled me back anyway.”  
“I am sorry for that.”  
Peggy, who was trying very hard not to think about Jarvis, had finally seen the floor. “Is that blood?”  
“It’s not human.”  
“I don’t know if that makes me feel better or worse.”  
“Technically,” Howard said. “And this is a good news bad news sort of thing. The more it misses us the more the machine becomes weaker. They won’t be able to keep it up before the energy pull brings on the government anyway. If Jarvis gets the other machine to work we’ll know the difference.  
Trust me.”  
“How?”  
“Trust me.”  
“Where’s the other machine Howard?”

Jarvis couldn’t feel any part of his body anymore. He couldn’t see anything but snow. The guide was tugging him along by a rope.  
He probably would lose limbs from this mess. He had never before been to the Alps and he would have been quite happy if he never saw them again. Oh, sure Howard couldn’t account for horrible weather and he would probably tell Jarvis that soon enough but it made the man feel better to imagine burying his bosses face in the snow.  
At least until Peggy or Catelyn told him to stop.

“And where exactly are we?”  
“London.”   
“When?”  
Vanessa smiled. They had stepped outside the blood. This was strange enough but it was still real. It was nice sometimes to know that you hadn’t imagined the strange and unnatural and, despite the sword, they didn’t seem like they would harm anyone. She wasn’t sure they could with Ethan around to stop them anyway.  
Howard had raised an eyebrow, “From her costume I’m guessing the bloody Victorian ages.”  
“Bloody?” Cat asked.  
For the first time Ethan managed a real smile, “You have no idea.”

 

The Hydra agents that had been waiting and trying to get Stark’s machine to work all collapsed a bit mentally when nothing happened. They had a pretty good idea this was going to mean death for someone.  
“What happened?”  
“Can you get it to work again?”  
“I’m not sure how I got it to work last time!”  
“It should… It should…”  
One of the underlings walked up to the man in charge at the site. Martin Vogel was not really terrifying.Not yet. But he watched the machine and the people hovering around it with cold blue eyes. He would be the one to see the Baron again and if it didn’t work. He would be the one that suffered. Yet everyone noticed that he didn’t look that upset.   
“Sir? Would you like me to make the report?”  
“Not quite yet son.”  
“Sir?”  
“So they didn’t come through the machine. That only answers one important question.”  
“What’s the other one?”  
This time Vogel did smile at him. Back before the war he was probably a handsome man. Probably a good man but he had saved the Baron in battle once and that was enough to put him into a lifetime of servitude even as a friend. He patted the kid on the back. “Whether or not we can go through, and on that note, we shall see soon enough right?”  
The kid’s name was Nick and near as he figured this was as good a paying job as any. Sides didn’t matter when you had to eat.  
But he couldn’t help feel sick at the thought of going into that machine. Going back in time…  
To make matters worse before he left the room Vogel turned on his heels and threw up his hands, “Just think! We’re searching for bones when we could have the real thing!”  
“Sir?”  
Everyone was looking now happy to see him happy sure that they wouldn’t suffer or be punished as of yet.  
“The monsters! The demons! The dragons! If this works we can build an unstoppable army!”  
“Sir?”  
Bring them here? There was a terrifying thought.  
Vogel must have noted the look on his face because he just laughed. "At least it would be one hell of a zoo! Keep working boys! This isn't failure but a fork in the road!"


	19. Witches and Power

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Howard drinks. Vanessa and Catelyn consider power and witches.

“Did you see the news?”  
Howard shook his head and poured himself another whisky. All things considered this wasn’t such a bad place. At least it was big and they had their own rooms. Bonus that this Sir Malcolm had some top notch booze. Not that Peggy was letting that bother her. “If you’re talking about the history books it’s not exactly news now is it?”  
“Vanessa made her some tea. She’s trying to get her mind off it.”   
“I don’t see why she’s so upset.”  
“Howard!”  
“Two of her children lost forever. They already were,” Peggy was about to interrupt him but he wanted to carry on. He was upset with himself. Taking Catelyn had been one thing. The idea of taking or at least finding the weapons and keeping them from Hydra had been a good plan. He didn’t even want to think of Hydra in his house. So far he could only hope that Jarvis was okay seeing as how the man technically hadn't even been born yet.  
So instead he finished another drink and sat himself down on the edge of the bed. “Maybe you’re right about me.”  
“Which part?”  
“That I’m a dangerous man.”  
“You always knew that Howard.”  
“I should have just let things lie.”  
“Yes,” of course then Peggy thought of Steve and she thought of what she longed to do with the machine. “You should have left it with Catelyn. Perhaps we still can. She could come to work for us.”  
“Doing what?”  
“That’s beside the point.” Peggy told him. “What are we going to do now? If Hydra activated the machine once…”  
“Perhaps they can do it again?”  
“My fears exactly, at least if we were to get back to our time we could stop them at your place anyway.”  
“We’re trapped,” he poured himself another and not for the first time in this generally short conversation Peggy wondered how many he had. “We’re trapped in God-damned time Peg.”  
“Howard..."  
“It’s an endless circle that we can’t yet break free from. My very first act of turning on that machine cursed us all. Even Hydra. Even the past.”  
“Howard I’m going to hide the alcohol if you don’t start making sense.”  
“Ha! Sir Malcolm is an explorer. He has plenty of it. What do you think Hydra really wants?”  
“To rule the world. To shape it in their glory.”  
Howard shook his head. “Let’s say the attack in London was caused by found caches of wildfire.”  
“People spontaneously combusting,” Peggy shuddered at the thought. “In King’s Landing it was simply burning.”  
“Ah, the good old days!”  
“Howard…”  
“We’re missing pieces of the puzzle.”  
“Well, as you said, we did help to break it.”  
“Where do they go next?”  
“You should get some sleep.”  
“I doubt that well help.”  
“I doubt it as well.”  
He lifted the glass to her and finished it off with a smile, "One day I think they'll be an even worse time traveler than the three of us."  
Peggy managed a smile in return and patted his shoulder. She really did love him. Even if she often wanted to kill him, "I hope they confine them to the comics."

 

Catelyn watched the woman carefully. Considering she was a witch Cat wasn’t quite sure what to make of her. The story she had just told her about the witches that she knew had not been the least bit helpful. Cat wasn't even sure she wanted to stay in the house anymore. But the woman smiled the whole time she made her the tea.  
Catelyn tried not to shake when she drank it. “I must admit Miss Ives there’s a part of me that doesn’t want to stay in the house any longer.”  
“You’re perfectly safe here and call me Vanessa.”  
“At least now I know why you don’t fear me.”  
“Why would I fear you?”  
“I’m dead.”  
“You are,” Vanessa leaned forward. “Special. Outside of time… Chosen…”  
“By who? Howard?”  
“Fate.”  
Catelyn couldn’t help feel cold at the thought. Of fate she had never been a fan but then she had gotten a pretty poor deal of it. “You’ll adjust,” Vanessa promised.  
“I’ll go home.”  
“Either way. You’ll learn to see.”  
“I can see. I can see now.”  
Vanessa pulled away. A part of her realized that she was treating this woman rather poorly. Friendly yes but as Ethan would tell her she wasn’t an animal behind glass to be looked at and examined. Vanessa would have to control her excitement.   
“You know, I knew a witch once,” Catelyn admitted. “Though I always wondered if I hadn’t imagined her.”  
“You mean the Red Woman?”  
“Ah, so she does survive?”  
“In name only.”  
Though if the stories about her were true anything could be possible. Perhaps she had always survived. Catelyn had thought she had dreamed the shadow of Stannis that had killed his brother and even before the Twins she had heard other stories about his Red Woman. She thought about the stories of her own death that no one wanted to tell her. As though she couldn’t read them in a book. She shivered at the thought. She had read about her death in a book. That wasn’t natural.  
None of this was natural.  
“Vanessa, let’s say you wanted real power. A real weapon from the past…”  
She laughed, “Why would I want anything like that?”  
“Not you personally. Do you know your history?”  
“Somewhat. I know that Sir Malcolm was quite taken back in the day with finding Winterfell. He told me once amongst his friends there are stories…”  
“Stories?”  
“That the place itself holds power. That there was something hidden in the crypts.”  
“There was nothing in the crypts but dead people.”  
Not that she could know that. Catelyn realized there was a lot of things she didn’t really know about her life. That was also something painfully hard to read in the books. “But I think your right about the North. And Hydra…”  
“I’m sorry?”  
“Friends of Peggy and Howards. Of a sort,” she admitted under her breath. Catelyn didn’t know much more than they had told her about Hydra but people being capable of great evil, that was something she understood. How do you get real power? You say it was handed to you from another divine power.  
“They’re going to go to the North,” Catelyn said. She knew it. She could feel it in her bones. “For Winterfell and Melisandre.”  
Vanessa raised an eyebrow.  
“They already found the Citadel. Now they’ll want R'hllor."


	20. Visions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catelyn dreams of the bastards, witches and the horror of the past she could have had while Jarvis takes a chance.

In her dream she was home.  
In her dream she was in Winterfell back in her warm rooms. Her door had been left cracked though she knew Ned would be down in the halls with the men for most of the night. He had been back from Robert’s latest war for the last couple of days and she had already taken a monopoly of his time.  
But she was so tired.  
Arya finally slept and Catelyn was afraid to breathe for fear she’d wake the child. She thought she might have drifted off herself when she heard the noise, her eyes opened as though she hadn't slept even for a moment and she tried to stay perfectly still. She loved her newest child but she was pleading with every God that might help her to get through one night without her crying. Because Arya didn’t just cry once she was up it seemed as though you’d never get her to sleep. She heard the noise again and flipped over hoping it was Ned.  
Catelyn was surprised to see the dark-haired boy standing over Arya’s crib. She suffered a flash of anger but bit her tongue.  
She was to tired to fight.  
Jon looked up at her and he couldn’t hide the flash of fear that made her feel, for a moment, like the worst human being alive. Catelyn sat up and held a finger up to her lips. The child was smart. He got the hint and nodded his head. After a moment he walked around the crib toward her.  
Catelyn panicked. The child had never even come in her room before… She fought an insane urge to back away from him.  
“I…”  
“Hush. If you wake her I swear I’ll make you be the one to stay up all night with her.” She thought he almost smiled. He looked at her awkwardly but he didn’t come any closer though she thought he might have wanted to.   
“I had a bad dream and I thought, I wanted to make sure you and her were okay…”  
“What did you dream about?”  
He shook his head. They were talking so softly that this itself seemed like a dream. Sometimes Cat thought she could learn to love this boy. If only she never had to think of his mother. “You’ll feel better if you tell me.”  
“We we’re drowning. But it was snow. The snow was…”  
“Oh Jon,” she wanted to offer him some comfort but she just couldn’t bring herself to. She didn’t even know if the child would let her touch him. Bitter feelings of his possible mother, the woman Ned really loved, came back to her then and she looked away before he could see her tears.  
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”  
“You didn’t wake me and you don’t have to worry about the snow,” she forced a smile. “I know sometimes it feels like it will never end but it always does. It always melts.”

In the blink of an eye the child Jon was gone and she was not in her room anymore. She gasped…  
There was ice all around her. But she felt strangely warm. Catelyn thought she might be on top of the wall.  
“Hello?”  
“Lady Stark?”  
Jon looked older than the last time she had seen him. He looked older and more worn down just like the rest of them. There was real shock in his eyes as though he was truly seeing her.  
“Jon? What in the world?”  
“What are you doing here?”  
“I don’t know…”  
The red woman walked out behind him then. She hadn’t changed at all since Catelyn had seen her. She seemed to appear like she had moved right out of his back. She gave Catelyn a smile that sent her scurrying back.  
“Careful!” Jon cried reaching for her.  
“What is she doing here? Don’t trust her!”  
Jon pulled away as though he remembered who this was even though his instinct had been to reach for her. Melisandre stepped in between them and looked Catelyn over like Balerion looking over a piece of fish Ethan had given him. “I could say the same for you. What are you? Not a ghost…”  
“Stay away from him!”  
Melisandre shook her head. “I saw you dying. I saw you burning.”  
“I didn’t burn.”  
“Lady Stark? What are you doing here?”  
“Jon…”  
But before she could reach for him before she could figure out what in the world to tell him even though she didn’t know what she was doing there Melisandre had turned her head again.  
It seemed as though something had snapped in the air and she felt it. “The monsters are coming.”  
“Walkers?”  
“No.”  
“Lady Stark, I’ll get you to safety.”  
“No!” the Red Woman interrupted the jewel at her neck shining bright as her eyes. She was smiling again and then she just laughed. “Oh, this is going to end badly! This is going to end so badly for you…”

Everything changed again and Catelyn was in a broken palace a place she didn’t recognize looking up at the sky through a ceiling that didn’t exist any longer. The bones of the place were huge.  
She could see the full moon clearly. She thought she may have known this place after all. In her bones…  
In her skin…  
“Harrenhal?” she whispered and something snapped behind her and she felt it. She wasn’t alone any longer. She turned carefully and looked right into her own eyes but they were red and horrible, her skin was falling off and her hair gone gray but that wasn't as bad as the gash across her throat. Cat stifled a scream and took a step back.  
Crows seemed to sense her fear and bolt screaming from the broken towers above her. It did not help calm her in the least. The thing took a step closer and held out a crown- Robb’s crown. It reached out to her with the other hand and she woke up just barely managing to keep herself from screaming and bringing the whole mansion running.

Vanessa Ives was in Malcolm's study when Cat had her nightmares but she could sense them nonetheless. She waited and then sensed something else.  
"Ethan?"  
In her empty room one machines light had started and soldiers were running frightened backward through time.

In the future Jarvis was trying to remember the directions Howard Stark had left him. But Howard had always been maddeningly vague about these things. "It's a proximity thing."  
“What?”  
“Set it wide if you don’t know any better. It will find me. Me and anyone around me.”  
“What if I bring back something by accident?”  
“Let’s hope you don’t.”  
Jarvis closed his eyes and said a quick prayer and then turned on the machine just like Howard said and he brought every living thing in the mansion with him in that moment. Only Vanessa, Catelyn and Howard were really awake in that moment so he had just enough time to reach for the sword before Jarvis brought them all home.


	21. Messing with History

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catelyn and Vanessa argue for continuing while a new so-called Lord of Light claims power and Sousa learns the Hydra team in Howard's place has taken the next step.

“We have to go back!”  
“Where are we?” Ethan asked again.  
“The operative question is when.”  
“Why do people keeping saying that?”  
Vanessa turned around and calmly told her friend, “I believe we are in the future. But not the place I was before.”  
“No, you’re in the Alps. Thanks a lot for that by the way Sir.”  
Howard completely ignored the comment only to pat Jarvis on the shoulder and smile, “You’re the best man! Peggy?”  
“I’m checking in! I’ll be right back!”  
“Howard!” Catelyn finally yelled getting everyone else’s attention. Then she felt that was a rather unladylike thing to do. She took a deep breath and offered an apologetic smile. “Sorry for yelling.”  
“Never had a problem with it myself,” Ethan told her.  
“We have to close down the machine,” Howard told her. “I’m very sorry. You can stay with us. You two we’ll send back.”  
Vanessa wasn't thrilled, “I want to see this world!”  
“That’s probably for the best,” Ethan said at the exact same moment.  
“You started this mess Howard Stark!”  
“Humanity started this mess!”  
No one knew what to say to that for a minute until Jarvis finally threw up his hands and yelled, "You're blaming humanity for this?" They ignored him to.  
“I think I know what they’re looking for. They found the Citadel and already found weapons there.”  
“At least stashes of wildfire. I think anyway. There was no way to conclusively test that but it makes the most sense.” Howard offered.  
“They’re going to go after Rh’llor next. I saw it in a dream.”  
“Oh Lord.”  
“Hear her out,” Vanessa warned him. “Dreams have power.”  
“Only that which we give them.”  
“Not where I’m from,” both women answered at once.  
“No! No same time talking and such. That's too much for me.”  
“We have to go to the North.” Catelyn told him. “I saw Melisandre there and she said other monsters are coming.”  
“In a dream?”  
“Yes!” Catelyn truly hoped that she didn’t sound as desperate as she felt and she tried not to think of the last part of that dream. “Jarvis, you told me that legend tells of a weapon in the crypts of Winterfell.”  
“Or a treasure,” Howard told her. “That all depends on whose telling the tale. We already messed with the past Catelyn…” at the sound of her name the cat cried from by the desk. They hadn’t even noticed him come through with them but now everyone turned to look. Balerion glared them down.  
“Jarvis?”  
“Sir?”  
“We have a cat.”  
“I’ll get some milk.”  
“Wait a minute!” Ethan shook his head. “Forgive me for being the voice of reason here but you already messed with the past… What does that even mean?”   
“We slightly threw off a crazy woman. Not entirely our fault.”  
“We have to see this through,” Vanessa told them ignoring the look she got from Ethan.  
“We?”  
“Howard?”  
He had known her long enough to realize just from the look on her face. “What’s wrong Peg?”  
“Do you have a radio? Perhaps even a television?”

Howard did indeed have a television though it took forever to work so they wound up listening to the radio broadcast after all. “They call him Nicholas Van Wild. But our people think it's the Baron.”  
“Isn’t that?”  
“Probably.”  
“Isn’t that what?” Ethan asked.  
“He’s Hydra.”  
“Well, he’s saying he’s the second coming. Not a good sign where I come from.”  
Catelyn listened to him talking about how the light would fight the shadows. How the darkness could only be beaten by him, the chosen one risen again, the Lord of Light. She felt a shiver of recognition race through her.   
Peggy leaned forward and whispered to Howard, “He came out of nowhere. At least this time. We didn't even have him on the radar. Thought he died in the war."  
“Only by the power of Rh’llor can the darkness of this world be defeated.”  
“Oh, please. Anyone can say their some old God,” Howard rolled his eyes.  
“And I will bring back the Fire!”  
They heard the crowd cheering on the radio. Catelyn didn’t know how these things worked but she thought the crowds sounded ridiculously and unpleasantly loud.   
“I will bring back the dragons! We will live Valyria once again!”  
Howard reached over and turned off the radio plunging them all into a silence so that the only sound was Balerion happily bathing himself and getting comfortable in the center of Howard's antique and rather expensive desk. But the cat was a problem for a later date. "You know," Howard said slowly. "You guys weren't around for the last war we had but it's nice to know that we didn't learn any lessons."

 

A couple of hours after talking to Peggy and learning of the strange activities Howard Stark was getting up to and the much bigger problems a Shield team infiltrated the mansion. It was Commander Daniel Sousa that was in charge of that raid and all he netted were a few already dead bodies and a strange machine giving off an energy and heat that didn't feel right to any one in the room.  
“They killed themselves Sir. Arsenic.”  
“Guess they didn’t want to be captured.”  
“In the teeth,” another soldier held up an empty unswallowed capsule. Daniel just sighed. “How old-fashioned of them.” He knew there was more trouble here then the soldiers could imagine. These people weren't left behind. They hadn't been dead that long. Some of them were just slipping away when the Shield team entered. They hadn't even bothered to put up a fight. "What were they waiting here for?"  
Daniel turned back to the machine and closed his eyes a couple of times. Someone else had gone through. It was the only thing that made sense.  
“Sir?”  
“Do you think when they get done fucking up history any of us will still exist?”  
“Should I put the call through to Mister Stark?”  
“I’m partly talking about Howard Stark.”


	22. Magic at the Wall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cat, Vanessa, Peggy and Ethan all find death and magic at the Wall. Brandon reaches out to his mother.

Howard started the machine again.  
Once they even thought that the Hydra soldiers had gone back they knew they had to. Technically Sousa still had the machine in the states but Howard had no idea how to get them back that way since he couldn’t know what coordinates they put in or, if they had even thought about putting in for a correct return.  
In other words they were seriously screwed. “Congratulations Howard,” Peggy told him. “You’ve helped to create a mess the likes of which it will take years for the scientists to even figure out.”  
“I’m thinking we shouldn’t tell anyone at all.”  
This time it was decided that Howard would stay with Jarvis and wait while Ethan, Cat, Peggy and Vanessa went back. “I’m only giving you two hour intervals. This is purely an information gathering mission at this point.”  
“Why are you all looking at me?” Catelyn asked. "You think I'm going to do something crazy?"  
"I don't know you that well," Ethan answered.  
“Luckily,” Howard continued. “Since I was smart enough to put the secondary machine here and I’m ignoring any eyes rolls at that Peggy, you will all be dressed for the cold.”  
“If we don’t know when they went,” Ethan interrupted. “How do you decide where to send us?”  
“I’m taking the easiest of chances.”  
“What’s that?”  
“That they didn’t do anything at all and just figured out how to turn it on basically.”  
“Sounds good.”  
“Not really. Look at the time period. There's got to be a fifty-fifty chance I'll be putting you right into the middle of a battle..."  
After his boss spoke Jarvis step up, "What Mister Stark really means to say is good luck!"

Every time Catelyn walked through it had gotten easier. This time the fear that raced through her was quite different. She felt anticipation. She felt dread. She took a deep breath and tried to gather her thoughts.  
Peggy must have noticed because she reached over and took her hand and gave it a squeeze. “I never believed I’d do anything like this!”  
Catelyn just smiled. “There are so many things happening that I never believed I would do…”  
Then she walked through the light and they came out into an absolutely mind-numbing cold. It was the type of cold that immediately bit into the others despite the more appropriate clothing Howard had given them. She was in the North. She knew it in her bones.   
She thought it all looked familiar. She had never been to the Wall the few times Ned had gone but now she stood in front of the structure and she felt as though she remembered it. Vanessa had walked up next to her. Out of everyone else she had adjusted as quickly as Catelyn. “There’s a power here. A presence.”  
“I never thought it was real,” Ethan admitted.  
“Do you sense anything else?”  
“Magic.”  
“We can’t just stand here,” Peggy said. “And we can’t exactly climb our way into the structure.”  
“Well, we have two hours to kill.”  
“My fingers and other things will fall off long before that!”  
“It’s okay,” Catelyn said.   
“What are you doing?”  
“I’m going to go to the gate and announce our presence.”

As it turns out they didn’t need to announce to any presence. The gates weren’t so much open as broken apart. Ethan insisted on going into the courtyard first but they followed after him only to find it strewn with bodies. They walked quietly among the dead. Catelyn felt sick at the thought of the bastard. Jon. Jon.  
Peggy had noticed that blood was frozen, splattered high on the wall as though people had literally been flung into it.  
“These are Wildings with the Crows.”  
“Yes,” Peggy answered. “The history always went that the Lord Commander let them through and that’s one of the reason he was killed.”  
Ethan and Vanessa, she noted, looked easy enough among the dead. “I don’t see any gunshot wounds.”  
“Gunshot?”  
“We’re thinking anyone from our time they would have used our weapons.”  
“I know. I know. The little bit of reading I did in Howard’s library I have the general idea…” Cat just sighed. “How can we manage so many ways to kill each other?”  
Vanessa waved her hand over the dying fires. There was a kiss of heat and light still in the air.  
At her movement some of the tinder still flickering orange bounced and she glanced up toward the ice wall. It seemed to groan at their presence.  
Cat took a couple of steps backward. She didn’t know why- if the wall fell they weren’t going anywhere.  
“What is it?” Peggy asked.  
“They’re on the other side,” Vanessa answered in a voice that sounded much colder than anything Catelyn had heard the woman say yet.  
“Who?”  
“The dead. I can see them. They’re rippling through the air.”  
Catelyn couldn’t help make a face that Peggy saw. She felt bad about it momentarily but Peggy gave her a little smile. “We should look around. Try to find anything. Jon Snow had a sword himself. They may want it.”  
“Jon Snow isn’t here.”  
“Still…”  
“We should burn them,” Vanessa said suddenly but not surprisingly. “I mean as long as we’re a part of this we don’t want them coming back against us.”  
“We don’t have the time.”  
“It’s a burning Ethan not a burial. I’d do it for you.”  
“That’s sweet,” Peggy muttered half to break the mood and half honestly. “I had someone I’d do that for once upon a time.”

Cat found herself before what she imagined had been the Heart Tree for the Night's Watch. She reached out to touch the face but it had been so deformed, so marked up, it looked like someone had taken a sword to it in a fit of rage.  
She shivered at the thought of it. Maybe it was the magic of traveling through time or being at the wall but she could feel it in the air… She could almost see it… Cat forced a laugh and dropped her head into her hands.  
“I’m losing my mind.”  
She heard the beginnings of a fire and saw light from the courtyard. Perhaps Vanessa had convinced Ethan to burn the dead. All things considered that was probably a good idea. She was just turning to go back and pay her respects. The Night’s Watch and the Wildings they were, in a way, her husband and her children’s people.  
“Mother!”  
The voice stopped her cold. She felt her heart skipping a thousand times. She knew it. She hadn’t heard it in so long but she would know it anywhere.  
“Mother…”  
“Brandon?”  
A crow cried from the dead trees and she turned back toward them. She wasn’t dreaming this. She wasn’t. She could feel him with her in a way she hadn’t since she heard the news.   
“Bran?”  
The stories of her middle son had been strange. She knew now that they had survived Winterfell but that Bran had been lost in the North and written off as dead. She found herself leaning against the tree but strangely she felt warmer than she had in many moons. "Brandon?" her son was with her again and she couldn't stop the tears as she broke at the thought of him.

Brandon Stark was reaching out for his mother. When he had seen her at first he thought it was a dream or a memory but she was wearing the strangest clothes and traveling with people who had just appeared. “Why is she at the Wall? You said she was dead!”  
“This is magic…”  
“You said she was dead!”  
“She was dead!”  
For the first time since Bran had meet him Bloodraven looked confused and worried in a way that smart child didn’t like. He glanced back toward his mother. She hadn’t changed a bit. She looked older and sadder but how he wished he could really hug her! He would have given anything!  
“I have to get her out of there! What should I tell her?”  
“It’s not right,” Bloodraven was saying. “It’s not right…”  
“Fine time to be useless!”  
“Brandon?”  
He heard it at the same time his mother did. They all heard it at the exact same moment. In the courtyard even Vanessa looked stunned and frightened as the creature flew above them appearing in the air as though it had come out of the wall itself. Ethan couldn’t even bring himself to reach for the gun.  
“Mother?”  
But Catelyn didn’t turn away. She couldn’t. Above her flying around the wall was like something from Old Nan’s stories. Peggy hurried toward her never taking her eyes off the thing. “Is this real?”  
“You would know!”  
“Only from the stories!” Cat shook her head, “It’s circling!”  
The Ice Dragon was beautiful. It was the biggest thing Cat had ever seen in her life. Even next to the wall its size was enormous. Peggy held her hand tightly but she found she wasn’t afraid. It wasn’t roaring at them or threatening them. It was circling the bodies not getting that close to the wall.  
“I think…”  
The others had joined them at that point a look of childlike amazement on their faces. “Did you even see where it came from?”  
Peggy shook her head.  
“I can’t believe it!” Ethan cried. “What’s it doing?”  
It was watching over the bodies Cat couldn’t help but think. The dead Wildings and Night’s Watch and the sound it was making the sound made the air around them come alive but not with the same sadness and fear they had felt when they arrived.  
“It’s mourning them,” Vanessa whispered. “It’s mourning them.”


	23. Ethan Returns

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ethan returns alone while Howard & Jarvis mull the likely options.

“You’re pacing.”  
Howard rolled his eyes and poured another drink. “Don’t tell Peggy but I think things might definitely have gotten out of control.”  
“You think?”  
“I don’t pay you to judge Jarvis.”  
“You also don’t pay me to climb mountains in the middle of blizzards and activate time machines.”  
“Really?”  
“Well, okay. You do pay me for that but that’s beside the point.”  
In his library Howard kept a hand drawn map of what scientists and historians imagined to have been Westeros back in the day drawn over the map of the current world as we knew it. Jarvis and he had brought it into the lab with the machine and hung it on the wall where Howard alternatively paced and stared at it.  
Jarvis walked over to his side.   
“Any news from Sousa?”  
“They have a lead outside of Rome. Sending in a team. We should know more in a couple of hours.”  
“We have to get ahead of this. We have to set this right or it’s never going to end. So if they sent a team through…”  
“It’s likely that the machine was activated.”  
“Yes, thank you. I can’t imagine how they could have figured out to change anything in such a short period of time. At least not without huge risks to themselves.”  
“Which would have put them?”  
“King’s Landing. What’s left of it any way.”  
“Then why did you send the other’s North? Just to chase down the Red Woman?”  
“Catelyn thinks she’s important. She thinks that whole R’hllor mumbo jumbo is important. We already have the Blackfyre sword…”  
“If it even matters. You may just be collecting antiques.”  
“Thanks for making me feel better Jarvis. But you’re right. It’s not about that anymore. It’s about putting things to right.”  
“Troublesome thought Sir, but if Hydra deserted the machine, even if they sent people through doesn’t that mean they don’t expect them to come back?”  
“You know what I’d do if I got lost in time?”  
“I sincerely hope that I never find out.”  
“Me too. But I’d send my future self a message.”  
Jarvis didn’t even blink, “Completely insane.”  
“Why?”  
“Completely insane.”  
“According to history the Nights King…”  
“According to history?” Jarvis cried. “We can’t even tell the difference between history and story! The Nights King is a legend!”  
“Or perhaps he’s their equivalent of Hydra.”  
“Where are you going with this Sir?”  
“The Targaryen girl came into the battle in the Riverlands. I think that’s where any Hydra team would go.”  
“Well, they can’t bury a dragon and leave if for anyone to find in the future!”  
“They can bury eggs! They can bury bones! I’m sending them into the Riverlands next. They can monitor for any Hydra team. Ethan and Peggy can take them out and yes before you think I’m being completely altruistic Vanessa and Catelyn can get close to the Queen. What?”  
“Do you hear yourself?”  
“Always.”  
“Do you not think it’s an incredibly bad idea to send Catelyn Stark back into the Riverlands?”  
“What choice do I have? She’d be the best one to meet with Daenerys’s if it comes to that. We’re in uncharted territory here man but from everything I’ve seen so far and everything I’ve ever read about her relying on Catelyn Stark is only a good idea.”  
Jarvis opened his mouth to argue when the machine kicked up again. Howard patted his shoulder but shook his head. They knew they’d both have to argue about the situation later. Jarvis hoped that Peggy would at least take his side.  
But only Ethan appeared looking both furious and worried at the same time. “Send me back!”  
“What happened? Where are the girl’s?”  
“You got to send me back. Aim for Winterfell.”  
“I don’t aim for anything. It’s a guess and a vicinity.”  
“He crosses his fingers and hopes for the best,” Jarvis added. “What in the world happened Mister Chandler?”  
“Nothing bad, yet. Get me as close as you can.”  
“Where are…?”  
“They turned off the trackers you gave us.”  
Howard’s eyes went wide. That didn’t sound like Peggy. “What in the world for?”  
“So the Ice Dragon could take them.”  
“I’m sorry. What?”  
“It wouldn’t take me,” Ethan said and for just a second he looked rather sad thinking about it. “Only the three of them. Catelyn seemed to believe it wanted to take them home, to Winterfell I assume.”  
“And you let them go?”  
“I don’t know about the other two but stopping Vanessa is nearly as impossible as a… well, I would have said a dragon…”  
“Oh good Lord!”  
“It did go south of the Wall but since it’s made of ice I imagine that it’s not going to leave the North.”  
“It’s going to take time to get that close not to mention you really would be in the middle of a battle,” Howard told him already fiddling with the addition on a pad. Then he stopped and looked up at Ethan who was still shaking quickly melting snow off his heavy coat. Somehow he felt and looked colder in the lab then he had been at the wall. He meet Howard’s eyes.  
“I don’t know anything about history. You understand that right?”  
“You really saw a dragon?”  
“Yeah, yeah, I did.” Ethan smiled just a little and Howard joined him. A thrill passed through the air shared by all three men. “And they’re riding it…”  
“Peggy’s riding a dragon Jarvis.”  
“Never doubted her for a moment Sir.”  
"Tell me what happened..."


	24. The Stars and the Snow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catelyn, Peggy and Vanessa ride to Winterfell.

They had been in awe of it at first. The dragon landed a good distance from the fire shaking the ground when he did so. They didn’t notice it at the time but the wall shivered and cracked just a little. Vanessa was the first to move toward it but the thing turned its head and Catelyn saw the strangest thing in its eyes.  
Winterfell.  
“What are you doing?”  
“I don’t know,” she whispered.  
“Be careful!”  
“I saw home!”  
“It won’t hurt us,” Vanessa promised.  
“Do these things shot fire?” Ethan asked. “I mean I wouldn’t think so since it's ice but you never know right?”  
It let Catelyn touch it. She expected to feel cold but the creature was actually hot to the touch. The heat that seemed to pass right from its heart. On the other side Vanessa patted his back running her hands lightly down his flanks. He moved his head just a little and seemed to be fine with them. “We could ride him…” she offered.  
“What did you just say?”  
“Ethan trust me.”  
“It’s a dragon. I’m still not entirely sure this isn’t some sort of spell or something.”  
“There’s definitely magic involved.”  
Catelyn was the first person that moved to actually mount the ice dragon. Peggy noticed at the last minute and reached out a hand to stop her but Cat shook her head. Once she was on the dragon, and it was still calm and quiet, she reached out for Vanessa.  
“This is a bad idea,” Ethan said for the thousandth time. “We need to go back soon.”  
“You go back. Tell Howard…”  
“Tell him what Vanessa?”  
Catelyn had turned her head away from the two of them and held out a hand to Peggy. The other woman just stared at her, "I'm not even particularly good with horses." But she reached for Catelyn and let her pull her up nonetheless.  
“It feels real…”  
“It is real.”  
“Vanessa!”  
“Ethan, go home.”  
“You don’t even know where this thing is going to take you! You said there’s an army behind that wall! And this is magic!”  
“Ethan, trust me.”  
“Vanessa…”  
“The dragon is going to take us where we need to go,” Catelyn told him. She was still trying to convince herself of that fact. A million of Old Nan’s stories flooded back into her head. Some little part of her had believed the old woman’s tales or at least parts of them even as she had told the children not to be afraid. The dragon moved forward seemingly not even bothered by their weight. It was uncomfortable and awkward but they managed to hold on.  
The funeral pyres at the wall were beginning to die down.  
Catelyn closed her eyes and leaned forward on the creature thinking of castle walls rising from the snow. Thinking of large rooms warmed by hot springs... Thinking of her husband sitting cleaning his sword smiling at her by the Heart Tree. She had no doubt where they were going or were they needed to go.  
She felt a blast of air and Peggy start beside her. When she opened her eyes all she could see were stars. Stars and snow. A white river that seemed endless. Next to her Vanessa was smiling brightly. She wasn’t the least bit afraid.  
Catelyn smiled back, turned her head up and took in stars so close she thought she could reach out and touch them. Maybe she was dead, she wondered for the thousandth time. Maybe she was mad. Maybe this was just a dream and she would wake up in her own bed. But strangely she felt freer than she ever had in her life.

The Ice Dragon took them further and further through the stars until they could see the beginnings of an army beneath them. He tilted a little bit but it didn’t seem like anyone could see them. Snow was falling again and while it wasn’t bad Catelyn figured it hide the dragon and his riders.  
“Where is he going?” Peggy yelled over the wind.  
“Why he?”  
“What?”  
“According to legend,” Vanessa told her. “Dragons could be one and then become the other!”  
Peggy didn’t care. She was enjoying this but not taking it as well as the others holding on for dear life. One hand wrapped in Catelyn’s coat and the other on the scales of the beast. “Remind me to ask him to show us when he lands!”  
Vanessa just smiled.  
“Home.”   
She hadn’t seen it in so long. Catelyn wanted to reach out… Winterfell rose from the snow and the darkness in the distance. The dragon moved to keep them high and far away from the walls. She could see candlelight in some of the windows and she could see things that were being rebuilt.  
"This is a dream..."  
She felt tears stream down her cheeks as the dragon came around behind the castle walls landing them with a rather loud thud in a snowdrift. Peggy was the first to lose balance and took Catelyn down with her. Cat reached for Vanessa who really did try to catch them but wasn't fast enough.  
It was a rather ungraceful return home. Vanessa dismounted much easier reaching for her new friends pulling them out of the snow.  
“Thank you.”  
“Thank you dragon.”  
“Sh,” Peggy warned. “We need to be careful. What should we do with him?”  
“I doubt anyone saw him. If they had we’d know by now. It’s magic that brought us here.”  
“Everyone blames the magic but what in the world does that even mean?” Peggy finally asked exasperated but there was no time to answer. “Catelyn? Cat! Where are you going?”  
Her hair had come loose in the flight and despite the cold the fur lined coat that Howard had given her was hanging off of her. She turned her head back to them and smiled, “I’m going home! Come with me…”  
“Did you not see the army? We aren’t even sure right now whose in that castle?”  
“I’m the only one who belongs there. Come on.”  
They had just started to follow her- completely against Peggy’s better judgment- when the howls of the wolves started. The dragon took off toward the stars. The cries of the wolves cut right through the air stopping them all cold for just a second but then Catelyn started moving again.   
“Wait!”  
“Don’t you think we should see where they are?”  
“I’m not afraid of wolves,” Catelyn told her.  
Vanessa nodded at her, “Nor am I.”  
With that the soldiers came out of the darkness surrounding them easily enough, “Perhaps you should have listened to your friend.” They surrounded the women in the snow. Peggy didn't know whether she should be happy or not that they weren't Hydra soldiers. At least they didn't have guns.  
She didn't want to think if they were Bolton soldiers. But Catelyn was looking closely at the lead, the man who had spoken, "Search them for weapons."  
"Mors? Mors Umber? I haven't seen you in years!"  
The big man looked completely stunned when Catelyn addressed him. He took a couple more steps toward the women and then a smile broke out on his face, “Lady Catelyn? Is it really you?”


	25. Ghost and the Past

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catelyn must explain herself to Stannis Baratheon outside of Winterfell and reunites with a wolf. Melisandre preaches miracles.

She did not want to be going away from Winterfell. But the men didn't listen to her. One of the Umber's had joked that she would likely take on the Bolton's all by herself and the mood Catelyn was in she would probably win. But she tried to stay calm. The last thing she wanted was a fight.  
“The first battle was won you’ll be happy to know many of the Frey soldiers died but we took our losses.”  
“And now?”  
“Now we siege.”  
A couple of men grunted. Vanessa and Peggy were both trying to be quiet and not ask too many questions. All they really had to go one was a history that they themselves might have changed. One of the soldiers reached out to touch Peggy’s jacket and she smacked his hand away lightly. But he was so very young that it made her think of another young man she had once known in a war that felt like a very long time ago but hadn't even happened yet.  
“Was that a real dragon?”  
“You haven’t thrown in with the Targaryen’s have you Lady Catelyn?”  
“Well…” She decided to ignore that question. “How bad are your losses? Why haven’t you taken the castle yet?”  
“You haven’t changed a bit.”  
The camp was a very strange affair. There were guards on duty and fires lit and the news must have come ahead of them because people were standing outside their tents whispering as they passed. “She’s a ghost…”  
“And the others?”  
“Look at the clothes!”  
“What magic is this?”  
"It's the red woman! Gave birth to a ghost to destroy the Bolton's!"  
The men stopped before the main pavilion with only Mors leading them forward, an even he didn't look thrilled to be going. “He hasn’t been in a good mood recently you understand?”  
“Does he know what happened at the Wall?” Peggy finally asked.  
“Of course.”  
“And what about other soldiers? Strange men with well…”  
“Peggy,” Vanessa warned. “Be careful.”  
But Catelyn had seen something else that caused her to step away from the tent. At first she hadn’t thought it had been real but the creature looked at her with the same strange eyes. “Ghost?”  
Everyone else stopped and the huge direwolf stepped toward her. “What happened to him? He limps!”  
She had never seen them at their full size. Grey Wind hadn’t even been fully grown when he… No. Her heart was ripped out just thinking about it so Catelyn did what she could and put it out of her head. The closer the creature came to her the more she admired it's beauty and grace despite the limp.  
She wondered if the animal would turn away from her. This was Jon’s wolf after all and they had never been… But no. She was stunned when he bowed his head and let her pat him. After a minute she removed the glove she had been wearing and scratched between his ears. Ghost moved even closer then.  
“Is he here?”  
“Jon? He never stays long…”  
At that the pavilions tent was flipped open and a man she hadn’t seen in more years than she could count easily or even remember appeared with a scowl on his face. Stannis looked as bad as the rest of his men if not worse. His face moved from Peggy and Vanessa, to his men, to Catelyn who had been kneeling in the snow with the wolf.  
When he saw her the scowl only deepened. Catelyn felt a low growl rumble through Ghost and she patted him again affectionately and stood slowly.  
“Lord Stannis.”  
A couple of the men flinched and she heard one whisper, “King,” as though she had made some great mistake.  
She refused to call him King. What she had seen in the tent with Renly came rushing back to her and she thought with some pain of Brienne and wondered where the girl was now.  
“Is this a trick?”  
“Sir?”  
He reached out and grabbed a piece of her hair roughly. That shocked her. Stannis Baratheon wouldn’t have touched her without leave before this, if at all, but she noticed he too was having a hard time walking and there was a stench about him.  
Infection?  
Had a wound turned?  
“Who are you?”  
“I am Catelyn Tully Stark and I suggest you remove your hand!”  
He did, immediately and that’s when the Red Woman appeared behind him. Her look took Catelyn aback but she turned away from her immediately and stared at Vanessa. For the first time Vanessa Ives seemed truly nervous. There was a power in the woman and she felt it. There was also a confidence and a cruelness that she had felt before with other witches. “The Lord of Light has sent us a sign!” Melisandre cried. Many of the men who had been linger cried out and a couple fell to their knees.  
Stannis mostly looked annoyed. Something Peggy noted immediately.   
“It’s a trick!” Stannis snapped.  
“I am not something from the Lord of Light…” she tried not to think of what the stories said about her and what she had become long ago.  
“I saw you in the fires! I saw you and your friends!”  
“Excuse me?”  
The wolves were howling again. Catelyn had never heard the area so full of wolves. She felt her heart pound faster and her blood singing through her veins. The fires got a little brighter than. Melisandre was going on and on about something and even more of the soldiers were surrounding them.  
“What is she doing?” Peggy whispered to Vanessa.  
“Mostly putting on a show.”  
“Mostly?”  
“Enough!” So Stannis still had enough power left in him to shut it down and bring about complete silence. “They said you died at that infernal wedding. They said they threw your body in the river…” Catelyn could remember it.  
She could feel it.  
“Stop…”  
“Are you a trick?”  
“I’m here to help.”  
“That didn’t answer my question. How did you get out of the Riverlands alive?”  
Melisandre started to answer that but Stannis cut her off with a wave and turned back to Catelyn. She could feel Ghost still sitting silently at her side and it gave her strength. “I was saved,” she admitted. “I was saved by a time traveling warlock.”  
Peggy just sighed and closed her eyes.  
Stannis didn’t say anything for the longest time and then leaned forward and asked, “Do you mock me?”  
“No?”  
“Give me one good reason I shouldn’t kill you?”  
“My Lord…”  
“I don’t want to hear it witch!”  
“She can deliver you the North and the Riverlands,” one of the soldiers cried and Cat began to recognize some of the Northern clans among the men and it made her heart glad.   
“How?”  
Good question, she thought.  
“If you touch her I’ll rip out your heart, my King.”  
It was Ned’s voice but at the same time she knew that it wasn’t Ned. Ghost had moved but she hadn’t even noticed. Catelyn took a deep breath. The snow was falling even harder now. To her surprise both Melisandre and Stannis seemed to stand down. She felt tears hot in her eyes and she wondered what in the world was wrong with her. She was not afraid.  
She was not afraid.  
So she turned around and came face to face with the Bastard. Only the name felt wrong now. He didn’t look as she remembered him and he didn’t look at her with the hatred she had expected. She felt the same strange emotions but it all seemed so long ago. Ned was dead. The woman he had loved was dead.  
And Jon Snow was standing in front of her looking at her with something like… “Rob? Is he with you?”  
This time she couldn’t stop the tears. His expression broke a little at that and after a minute he took a step toward her. Much like Ghost had been he seemed tentative and she was afraid for a minute. But it passed quickly and Jon closed the gap and wrapped his arms around her.  
It was Ned.  
It was Jon.  
She felt like a damn had finally broken and she cried silently on his shoulder while the others moved away going back to whatever they had been doing. They cried for so long even Stannis went back inside his tent to give them their privacy.


	26. Conversations in the Snow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jon and Catelyn think of things to say without giving away to much. Melisandre sizes up Vanessa. The wolves continue to give warning.

Peggy stood near the tent they had been given and stared at Winterfell in the distance. The snow was still falling but then again she couldn’t really be surprised about that. Despite the snow they were still keeping small fires lit. Enough that she wasn’t completely freezing to death. She thought of home and wondered if she was going to die here would she still live there one day.   
Impressive.  
It was a good thing Stannis had stopped them as Jon hadn’t thought they would be able to get in through the crypts like Catelyn had been planning. Stannis however seemed to have developed other plans the minute he set his eyes on Catelyn and didn’t think any of them needed to be privy to them.  
Peggy did take it as a good sign that they had looked at her as though she was mad when she brought up the question of the Hydra soldiers.  
“I don’t mean to startle you.”  
“You aren’t,” Peggy lied. “You’re Maege Mormont right?”  
The woman nodded. She had been present at the meeting in the tent though not introduced she had greeted Catelyn with a big bear hug. Peggy knew the stories of the Mormont women she just never imagined she’d be standing next to one on a cold evening in history.  
Thinking of that just about made her miss Howard.  
“Ever been in a siege before?”  
“Not quite like this.”  
The woman looked her up and down in a way Peggy worried about. In the tents she had simply asked Catelyn how she had survived and Peggy realized coming up with a story would have been a good idea. Oh, Cat had told Stannis the truth but he thought she was screwing with him.   
“Who are you really?”  
“I’m Peggy…”  
“Look at your clothes. The story you told about the men with the strange weapons… A warlock saving the Lady Stark…”  
“It’s all true. But I realize how it must sound to you.”  
“And the dragons?”   
“I can’t explain it. But I think it’s trying to help us. My friends believe that anyway.”   
Maege nodded, “Can you fight?”  
“Not in the manner that you can though I may surprise you.”  
“Well, the Lady Catelyn always did and she calls you friend…” Maege smiled at her but it seemed forced. Peggy imagined the woman was thinking about her daughter as much as anything else. About how Catelyn survived the Red Wedding for real. “Still I’d rather not see you flayed.”  
“I appreciate it.”

Jon had filled her in on things she already knew. It hurt her heart to see how sad he had been to tell her about Jeyne Poole, that it wasn’t his sister. But he was only telling her what Howard’s books already had. “Arya’s still alive out there. I know it!”  
So whatever Cersei had done in King’s Landing may have been early but it hadn’t changed things to drastically.  
Yet.  
She patted his arm. “We’ll find her Jon. I know that she’s still out there. Both the girl’s. Your brothers to.”  
“Aye, they’re looking for Rickon but Bran went beyond the wall…”  
“Have faith.”  
“I have little of it left Lady Stark.”  
Before tonight she couldn’t remember him ever calling her that to her face. She couldn’t remember him ever calling her anything. Her hand was still on his which felt rather odd all of the sudden but it was comforting nonetheless. Neither one of them pulled away.  
“Are you sure about tomorrow?” he asked for the thousandth time.  
“It’s a better plan than Stannis had. We’ll take the castle and evict those murderous traitors…” This time he really was smiling. “What?”  
“It’s good to see you.”  
She pulled her hand away and outside the wolves started howling again. Ghost lifted his head but otherwise didn’t move from her side. She thought of Grey Wind and that broke her heart so she had to push it aside and reached down to pet him again. “Does he not want to hunt?”  
“He seems happy enough here.”  
“You’ve asked me nothing about it Jon.”  
“I accept what you say. I have stories of my own.”  
She thought of what the books said that the Lord Commander had been killed by his men. She realized they had the same stories after their deaths. Ghosts haunting the world they had lived in. But despite that there were still certain things she didn’t know. Certain things that she couldn’t know.  
Where were the Hydra soldiers?  
How was Daenerys’s path changed?  
“We should sleep!” is all she could finally bring herself to say. “You especially my dear. I don’t want you tired in the morning!”  
“I wouldn’t worry. I don’t tire any longer.”  
“You don’t tire? Are you not still human?” She wished she had caught herself before she said it but the question hung heavily between them nonetheless. “Sorry. I have no right to question you.”  
“You’re right about sleep though. Ghost will stay with you and the others tonight.”  
“Should I worry? He should be with you.”  
“I’ll be fine for a night. Besides he seems comfortable enough here.”  
“Good night Jon.”  
It was a strange parting made even stranger by the fact they both knew it. She finally patted his shoulder and felt like an idiot for doing so but it got a smile out of him nonetheless and Catelyn laughed.  
“It’s good to be home!”  
“Good night Lady Stark. It’s good to have you here.”  
Catelyn was convinced he even meant it as he ducked out of the tent. She didn’t even have to kneel down to give Ghost another pat on his head. “You don’t have to wait here with me if you’d rather be with him.”  
But they direwolf only made himself more comfortable.

Melisandre was waiting for Vanessa as she made her way back to the tent. She had been walking the camp carefully. There was something off. Not in the camp itself. She rather enjoyed listening to the bawdy ghost stories of the Northern Tribes for a little while. The air itself felt wrong. The way the snow fell bothered her.  
The way the stars seemed to hide.  
Several times during her walk she thought she could hear the ice dragon above them. She found herself preoccupied with a snowball she hadn’t even remembered scooping up when the Red Woman stepped in front of her path, “You have real power…”  
Vanessa looked her up and down and then right in the eye, “Yes, I do,” was all she said before stepping around her and back into the tent. Melisandre looked after her as confused as she was intrigued but then saw the Bastard at Stannis’ tent arguing with him and decided she was far more needed over there.

“I’m not fond of that woman.”  
“No one is,” Cat told her. She and Peggy had been sitting on the edge of one of the cots the huge wolf at their feet. Vanessa missed Ethan every time she looked at the creature or heard the others howling from the woods.  
“You brought us snow.”  
“Something’s wrong.”   
“Let me count the ways,” Peggy snorted.  
“No. Listen…”  
“Do you understand them?”  
“Somewhat. They’re searching. Waiting. They can feel it to…”  
At that moment an intense gust of wind blew through even this sturdy tent. “You’re creeping out the children.”  
“What children?” Cat asked.  
“Just an expression. Never mind.”  
“No, your right though. I’m fairly creeped. Did I say that right?”  
Peggy smiled “Yes. Yes, you did. Very good.”


	27. Changes Begin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Howard and Jarvis worry over new reports while Ethan tries not to kill them. Hydra makes a leap.

Ethan paced the room. He was tired and annoyed watching Howard look at maps while Jarvis made him tea. “Do you want hot chocolate?”  
“I want to find Vanessa and go back to well, my time!”  
“We have to play this carefully. Whatever they’re doing it hasn’t effected things too much yet.”  
“What does that even mean?” Ethan exclaimed. He thought it could be true that what he really needed was a good night’s sleep but again he couldn’t really do that under the circumstances.  
“Strategic placement.”  
“What?”  
“We got a call earlier,” Jarvis tried to explain. “Sousa, well, friends in the states found caches of weapons. Weapons that could only have been built or made if they had some idea of the history.”  
“So you think they did bring weapons forward and we’re just behind the ball on it?”  
“Among other options.”  
“Do you know what I am?”  
It was Howard’s turn to look confused and then interested, “A rather tall man with excellent taste in women.”  
“What?”  
“Well, you and Miss Ives right?”  
“No, I ah… that’s not possible!”  
“I don’t see why not?”  
“This isn’t what we’re talking about.”  
“You brought it up!”  
Ethan shook his head then slammed down his hands on the desk and growled, “You’re maddening!”  
“Gentlemen! Gentlemen!”  
“What?”  
Jarvis wasn’t afraid of either one of them to be frank. He had seen so much else. Instead he turned the radio up. “Listen…”  
“All the reports say that this will be the longest winter on record,” the newscaster was droning on. “Some places are far worse than others. Sydney holds the record this year for fourteen inches of snow falling in a week’s time!”  
“It should be summer now,” Howard mused but another broadcaster interrupted his thoughts, “It’s been so long since I haven’t seen snow!”  
“Where is this broadcast?”  
“It’s out of New York.”  
“Well, at least it’s winter there.”  
“What’s the problem here?” Ethan interrupted. “We’re wasting time and God only knows what’s happening…”  
“Yes, it looks like the summer we thought had finally arrived after the war was simply a false one. This could be the longest winter on record topping the thirteen year winter that began in 1915.”  
“It seems like we’ve only had winters…”  
“Jarvis?”  
“Should I start with the library?”  
“See what you can find.”  
“What’s wrong? You people don’t like snow you should have come back in time with us!”  
“Mister Chandler, thirteen years of winter. False summers, you know what that sounds like? The past. Our history. Catelyn’s time.”  
“The belief of Catelyn’s time,” Ethan tried to explain. “Those were just stories and even if for some strange reason…”  
“We know it wasn’t just stories. We know from weather patterns of the past, wars, food shortages but that stopped. It was stopped. Only that newscast certainly didn’t sound like it.”  
“What are you getting at Stark?”  
“We may be too late. We may have already changed history.”

Nick shivered. He hadn’t wanted to come. That was about the last thing he told the others. He was last through besides Vogel. "Sir, I don’t want to go! Perhaps this isn't the best of ideas..."  
Vogel had just given him a cold hard look and then a smile, “Brave man staying here.”  
“Sir?”  
“Those who stay die.”  
Then Vogel had stepped through the machine. Nick lingered. It was an honor to be chosen his ass. For the thousandth time he thought perhaps he should have found better employers after the war but he supposed it was to late to change the past. His past anyway. Then he turned away from those that were being left behind in Starks place and took a step into it.  
He didn’t remember much else. The men had kicked him awake and all he could see was trees.  
Snow.  
Bloody snow.  
“Did we make it?” he asked groggily pulling himself up. Perhaps he was just dreaming? Perhaps it was all a dream?  
“Who knows?” a young man called Josh told him.  
Six men.  
Vogel had picked six men for this mission besides himself. It was quiet here and nearly peaceful. A couple of the men had wondered off to get their bearings. Vogel however had walked a little ways forward when he looked back at Nick he had a big smile on his face. Nick brushed snow off his jacket and walked over to join him. They were looking over a vast fast moving river that hadn’t yet fallen to the cold and frozen.  
It was early morning and the first light was just beginning to dance off of the river. It was beautiful Nick thought to himself.  
“Lovely.”  
“It’s the Trident. Can you imagine if it hadn’t dried up?”  
“How can you be sure Sir? How do we know this is the Riverlands?”  
Vogel was about to answer when they heard a roar in the distance. It was far enough away not to be terrifying but the sound of it cut through the world stopping every single one of them cold.   
Nick closed his eyes.  
There was another roar after that and another and he realized it wasn’t so much roaring as talking…  
“Holy!”  
“My God…”  
When he opened his eyes again he could see them far away dancing in what was left of the moonlight. All three dragons. “Come on,” Vogel said. “We’ll have to be careful but we’ve found what we’re looking for. We’ve found the Queen!”


	28. Warnings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A vision of Vanessa's causes her and Catelyn to take desperate action to throw the outcome of the battle.

“Catelyn?”  
“Catelyn?”  
“What?” She thought she might have just drifted off when Vanessa woke her. Her whole body felt like ice. That was something else she quite appreciated about Howard’s places. Of course she had to remind herself she was still outside and essentially in a tent. Peggy slept lightly on the cot on the other side of the room but one look at Vanessa’s face told Catelyn she would probably not be going back to sleep.  
“If I tell you something…”  
“What’s wrong?”  
“We have to get into the castle.”  
“They’re going to ride out at… What time is it?”  
“Trust me!”  
Catelyn tried not to falter at that one. The thing was she did trust Vanessa and even Ethan though she barely knew them but she had trusted people before and that had only lead to horrible things. Vanessa seemed to realize this and pulled her closer whispering in her ear, “I saw it in a dream. Can you believe me?”  
“Saw what?”  
“This attack will end badly. The gates need to be open and I saw us doing it. I saw them opening…”

Outside the first signs of light where just creeping upon them. The snow at least had let up. Ghost was sleeping in front of the tent and jumped up when the women exited. “No, you stay here!” Cat told him. “Stay with Jon and Peggy boy. We’ll be back soon…”  
It was easy enough to sneak around the guards. They must have figured sneaking off was the last thing a couple of women would do. Once they made it into the trees it was a bit of a roundabout to the castle but they moved quickly and gracefully despite the knee deep snow. Vanessa was ahead of her but it wasn’t as though she could go far without her.  
“Jon said that he didn’t think we could get in through the crypts but there are other ways. If we can make the Godswood.”  
“Make the Godswood?”  
Catelyn was trying to concentrate on the snow, “If you saw us opening the gates then it means we do right? Or at least you do. You can’t die here.”  
“I do not understand the rules of Howard’s magic but I’m fairly certain one thing is true anywhere and anytime.”  
“What’s that?”  
But she knew what Vanessa was going to say before she answered, “Death.”  
“Wait, Vanessa!”  
“What is it?”  
“I don’t hear the wolves.”  
Vanessa grabbed her arms and pulled her closer looking right in her eyes, “But can you feel them?”  
Catelyn could when she tried. She could feel them so easily that it felt like knowing where her children were. Suddenly the woods and lands around Winterfell teamed with the ghosts.  
“What’s going on?”  
“I do not know warfare.”  
“They’re warning us?" Catelyn wondered.   
Suddenly the silence was shattered by a horn. Catelyn felt it vibrate through the air so strongly that for a minute she thought it would shatter her bones. She gritted her teeth and closed her eyes. Behind them the men with Stannis and Jon were preparing. She only opened her eyes again when Vanessa pulled her forward so she didn’t fall into the snow.  
“At least they’ll be distracted!”

Nymeria moved forward.  
She urged the others on. She felt as though she was being compelled and pulled by something other than the desire. It was a desire to protect and a desire to fight. She would turn and fight when the time was right.  
Home.  
She could feel home.  
The army of White Walkers moved behind the wolves unable to keep up but not yet challenged. They had begun crossing through the unguarded wall in different places and now were converging on Winterfell.  
Nymeria could feel her brothers for the first time in ages. One was close.  
One was watching.  
Warning.  
The creatures behind her were only the beginning.

Peggy was not thrilled. She was far in the rear as the soldiers lined up to prepare and that only made her more furious. She knew that she would be useless in a battle like this but to be left behind was an insult. Not to mention Vanessa and Catelyn. Even the wolf had left her disappearing in the woods when his owner whispered, “Find her…”  
She watched the lines of horses.  
Forward.  
Forward.  
Those left behind were already bringing out supplies and preparing for the wounded. Peggy felt sick to her stomach thinking of the wounded she had seen in her lifetime when the Red Woman joined her.  
“They don’t take you with them?”  
“My power doesn’t lie in battle.”  
“Uh-huh.”  
The ground was shaking with movement, snow falling from the trees. Peggy wondered where the dragon was. Peggy wondered where Ethan and Howard were. She tried not to make matters worse by thinking about the Hydra soldiers. If they had indeed come to Winterfell maybe they had frozen.  
Or if the stories were right they’d been flayed. She almost laughed at the thought and then cursed herself. No one deserved that kind of fate. Melisandre noticed her smiling, “I see only good things this day as well.”  
“Well, bully for you!”

It was Vanessa who heard it first. Or perhaps she felt it first as they came near to the castle walls.  
“Wolves?” she wondered.  
“Doesn’t sound like it.”  
It was dogs making that horrible noise. Angry snarling dogs chained through the Godswood making a racket like no other. “At least their chained,” Cat whispered. They had ducked behind some of the larger tree. Neither one had a particular fear of dogs so much as the idea they didn’t want these dogs to be unchained.  
“And everyone else is…”  
“What do you hear boys?” a horrible voice echoed through the area. Catelyn felt her blood run cold.  
It was Vanessa who peaked around the tree.   
“Someone come to play? My wife return to me… Come out lovely girl and I’ll make it quick!”  
“I think its Ramsay Snow.”  
“He sounds like his father,” was all Catelyn had to say to that. Vanessa tried to wish the woman the mental strength not to freeze or be frightened. She leaned over and started to whisper. “I’ll distract him you make a run…”  
He ran for them as though he had known from the beginning they were there. Before she could even scream he had grabbed Catelyn by her braid and pulled her backward. Vanessa was only able to reach for her.  
She even grabbed her foot but Ramsay was stronger and quicker and he hauled her back and threw her into the snow only a couple of inches away from the mad dogs. “My dogs are hungry!” He was practically foaming at the mouth as he talked the knife already pulled. “And they love a woman!”   
Before he could cut her Vanessa threw herself into him and they both went flying hard for the ground. The disgusting knife knocked out of his hand. Ramsay laughing the whole time.  
“Go!”  
“I won’t leave you!”  
“I can handle him! You have to get to the gates!”  
“Ha! Ha! This is madness! Two women take this castle all by themselves!”  
“And the army outside! Go to the gates Catelyn! Hurry!”  
“Catelyn!” Ramsay was laughing as she got to her feet. She grabbed the knife and tossed it toward Vanessa who just nodded at her. “Is it you Lady Stark? Come to save your girl? Quite fun!”   
"You never had my girls Ramsay!"  
“Oh, yes I did! I want her back!”  
“Go!” Vanessa yelled still wielding the knife.  
Catelyn turned on her heels and ran through the path of mad dogs always just far enough of out of reach to drive them on. After watching her disappear Vanessa slowly turned toward Ramsay who was still laughing. "Going into Winterfell! Wonderful! She's as brilliant as they say!"  
Vanessa took a step toward him.  
"You are quite lovely," Ramsay tried again the laughter finally dying. The dogs still barking. "A beautiful sacrifice you'll be for the Old Gods."  
They were circling each other. Vanessa didn't blink. She was aware of everything in the Godswood.  
"And you seem to know who I am... Aren't you afraid?"  
This time she smiled. She could hear the clashes beginning outside the walls of the castle. "Aren't you?" Vanessa asked and with the mad light in Ramsay's face disappeared and it was only the darkness that charged her.


	29. Blood in the Godswood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Vanessa faces Ramsay and Catelyn gets help from the Ghost of Winterfell while Roose begins to lose it.

Catelyn thought this might have been a bad idea. She had slowed her path but it was still surprisingly easy to get into the main courtyard. She had little current information and only her memory of home. She saw a couple of soldiers- archers she noticed running through the courtyard and she ducked behind new wooden beams. It was a ghost of a place.  
A ghost.  
She could see where the fire had done the worst damage. She could see where they had begun to repair and rebuild.  
She could see Ned.  
She could hear the voices of her children playing and snowball fights in the yard and Arya and Sansa bickering with one another. She could see Robb, Jon and even Theon standing around helping Bran practice his archery.  
Breath.  
Breath.  
Catelyn tried to push past it. Ned would have wanted- no- she knew that she needed to be strong. Jon had told her the night before what little information they had seemed to be that Bolton was losing his grip under the stresses and Ramsay was running out of control as he had ever been.  
Jon said that the Manderly men had betrayed Roose’s men and they imagined their Lord to be dead but they hadn't yet displayed the body.  
“It’s possible that he’s not,” Catelyn had told Jon.  
“Do you really think that?”  
“You don’t know him as well as I do and truth be told I didn’t know him that well,” she smiled at the memory of the enormous man. She smiled at his betrayal. “I wouldn’t have thought to find such loyalty though. Robb should have…”  
Catelyn shook her head trying to concentrate on reality. She could hear the archers on the walls. Whenever the men rode out Roose made sure the gates were closed behind them.  
“And where does he go?”  
“That depends. Usually he stays on the wall.”  
She took another deep breath. Jon was in those fields and Vanessa in the Godswood and that gate needed to be opened. She peaked around the corner trying to push the ghosts aside.  
She heard Peggy’s voice. “We all have our broken hearts.” 

And stupid careless ideas Catelyn thought cursing her impulsive act. Even if she could get across the courtyard there was no way she could take the men at the gate by herself. She reached out trying to get her bearings and that’s when the man saw her. He was just a shadow in the yard anyway. He had been a shadow in Winterfell for a long time at that point and yet he was meet with a ghost in front of him..  
Was he dreaming this? Was the Lady really here?  
He adjusted his hood further over his head as the woman turned again he stepped the other way out of her vision.

Vanessa had been around enough fights in her life to know what to do. Before Ramsay could even scramble to get up, the minute she noticed him trying she raced forward and kicked him in the head sending him flying backward with a stream of blood that went everywhere, everywhere over the snow.  
She could feel the powers again.  
Do it.  
He was laughing. The little monster. “It will be such a shame to flay you!” His head snapped around. “I will flay you though! You’re much too good for the mutts! Who are you?”  
Vanessa thought about the stories she had heard about him and knew them all true seeing him in action. Those poor hunted women. The wife who ate her own fingers off. She held up her arm and felt her anger and their pain race through her and suddenly he was flying backward again as she threw him into a tree so hard that she heard and saw heavy strong branches cracking and falling into the snow.  
The dogs were going wild behind her.  
“A Rh’llor bitch!” he cried managing to pull himself up. He stood for a moment watching her and Vanessa marked something labored and wrong with his breathing.  
“I am vengeance.”  
“Ah! I like your flair for drama!”  
Vanessa saw it coming first and snapped her head back just in time to see one of the dogs finally break his chain. She didn’t falter. She simply stared the dog down as he raced toward her and spoke, “Stop!”  
The beast sat.  
They all did.  
Except for the human one who attacked her while she was distracted and threw her practically flipping her in the air until she was slammed down and there was no amount of snow on the ground that could make it hurt any less. Ramsay leapt on her so hard Vanessa felt ribs crack and she cried out in pain.  
It all happened so fast. Ramsay grabbed her hair and pulled her around getting right in her face. “What magic do you have left?”  
She gritted her teeth and drove the knife right into his heart. 

The hooded figure walked into the middle of the courtyard. As she did another form slipped off toward the gate.  
“Traitor!” she yelled to the people on the wall above her. To one man imparticular. Her voice shook when she said it the first time so she tried to calm herself and sound stronger the next. “Traitor!” A couple of the men turned around.  
“Roose Bolton!”  
This time her voice was much louder and echoed through the courtyard. Winterfell did not have enough men inside the walls. That much was clear. They just had a better ability to withstand a siege. People were turning now.   
“Roose Bolton!”  
This time he turned around. His eyes ablaze with the fury of a battle he wasn’t even fighting. Catelyn took her eyes off the wall for just long enough to see the man that had offered to help her approach the gates. The men there were distracted by her and the fight. But he came up behind the Bolton man and cut his throat easily enough.  
Catelyn flinched.  
She remembered the story of her death and she felt shaky and sick.   
Don’t look.  
Don’t look.  
“Gentleman! I think we found our killer!”  
“I name you the killer! I name you the turncoat and Kingslayer!”  
“Who in the seven hells? Kill it!” he ordered one of the archers. Luckily a young and frightened one who didn't know what to do. “Kill it!”  
“My Lord?”  
Catelyn smiled. It looked like perhaps there was some chivalry left in the game after all. She took a deep breath. The men were fighting at the gate. Outside the screaming had only intensified. Then she lowered her hood so that they could see her. So that Roose could see her and the look on his face was worth her life if it came to that.  
“Kill her! Kill her! Kill her!”


	30. Battles at the Gates

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fight for the castle changes course rather quickly.

Peggy had been doing everything she could to help nurse the wounded but they were already bogged down. She had just held a soldier as young as Steve, the first time she had meet him, he bleed to death in the snow while she couldn't do a damned thing to save him. People were screaming, moaning and Peggy felt as though was at the end of her rope. When suddenly she felt the air change around her. She had never much believed in premonitions but the wolves in the woods were howling a different tune and even the wounded were quieting.  
She stood and rather pointless brushed blood and snow from her furs. The Red Woman was standing not far away from her staring at the wooded area.  
The screaming began when the wolves appeared. Peggy moved for the crossbow that had been left. People were racing out of the way and knocking down others.  
Suddenly the biggest meanest looking wolf she had ever seen- even bigger than Ghost- appeared in the middle of it all and let out a howl that silenced and stilled absolutely everyone.  
She couldn’t bring herself to even shot at it. She had the strangest feeling that the other wolves were bowing. Then the giant creature moved off racing toward the battle, racing toward the castle leaving the others behind her. When she looked back at the others she realized they weren’t attacking. In fact they had turned around they were standing between the people and the woods backing up slowly but always between.  
Melisandre was backing up as well.  
“Make for the castle!” she yelled it but one no one listened to her she had to yell it again, “Make for the castle! There’s too many for me to hold off!”  
Peggy wondered for just a minute if it was the Hydra soldiers but she should have known better after the ice dragon. She really should have known better. They appeared all the sudden from the woods and once it began dawning on people the screaming began again.  
They were already too close. At first she thought they looked normal. Just like people. Just like the wounded and bedraggled all around her.  
But then a head was ripped off and she saw them. She saw the way they moved. She saw their empty, empty eyes.  
The wolves were first to the fight but the creatures were able to get ahold of the wounded and do as much damage as anything else.  
“Help them!” she screamed. “Help the wounded! We can’t leave them behind!” She knew it was a losing battle but it was one they would have to fight.

On the battlefield Stannis Baratheon’s ears had pricked at the silence and then the stillness. The monster wolf had come out of nowhere but moved so fast no one could so much as shot at it and he wondered for a moment if he had dreamed it. Then he heard the screaming from the camps behind him.  
“Others!”  
“Help!"  
"Help the wounded! We can't leave them behind!"  
Stannis turned his horse to go back to the camp to get as many people out as he could but a sea of terrified people were already rushing before him. A couple of his men had noticed as well.  
"Sir!"  
"Make for Winterfell! Get those gates open!"  
He looked around him and noticed that the creatures were throwing themselves into the line, into the fight. The Bolton men were trying to stay alive or running for the castle just as much as his men suddenly were. Stannis headed back toward the camp fighting the monsters the whole way.

The cross bolt to her leg was a blinding pain. She didn’t cry out though and she managed to stay on her feet. Ned would have been proud. The man at the gate who had helped her looked worried for a minute but she shook her head. He had killed his last man the minute Bolton had fired the bolt. It could have been worse Catelyn thought.  
“What a coward!” she cried out through gritted teeth. “To kill a woman from so far away!”  
“Who said I’m going to kill you?”  
She ignored the implication, “At least have the courage to give me the same death you gave my son!”  
“How are you even here?” Bolton yelled finally moving down the steps toward her. “I saw you disappear!”  
“I saw you betray the North!” Catelyn was backing away from him as best she could with her injured leg.  
He was almost down the steps. If he got close enough Catelyn could use the weapon the strange man had given her. The little arrow she held in her hands. She hadn’t been able to hide her surprise when she saw it. He had taken her hand gently and folded it around the weapon. “Just make sure you break the skin. His not yours.”  
Bolton was within swinging distance from her now. He shook his head almost as though he was sad, “You never should have come here.”  
“This is my home.”  
The screams were absolutely devastating at this point. Catelyn saw over his shoulder that most of the men on the wall had turned away and were firing desperately.   
“Lord Bolton!” one of the men yelled. She didn’t recognize him.  
“Lord Bolton!”  
“Walkers!”  
But it was in the split second that Bolton heard the gates being raised that he turned away from her Catelyn dug the poisoned arrow right into the skin of his neck. She knew she probably wouldn’t get away and sure enough before she could so much as move Bolton had grabbed her by the shoulder.  
She struggled as best she could but he was close enough that if the crossbow went off… when suddenly a massive pile of fur came and slammed into Bolton tearing directly into his throat as though he was nothing. Catelyn tumbled to the ground with him pain racing through her body.

Jon hadn’t believed it when he saw it but he recognized her. He recognized the creature that overtook Ghost.  
The creature that took down Bolton.   
The courtyard was filling with desperate people. “Others!” they were screaming surging in. Vanessa, who had come up beside him looked around her. They were getting through the gates with the poor soldiers. What had been a siege and a showdown of sorts was now turning fast into a catastrophe and a massacre.  
“Lord Snow?”  
“Can you get Lady Stark?”  
Ghost was racing through finding the dead that were haunting them taking them out as best he could but it was becoming a disaster. One of the Bolton guards raised a sword to a Wilding and Jon, furious cut him down before fighting his way toward the gate. Catelyn had managed to extract herself from Bolton though there was blood all over her. Vanessa got to her easily enough.  
The wolf seemed to be protecting her.  
“You made it!” Cat cried when she saw her.  
“We have to get you out of this mess!”  
“My leg…”  
“Lean on me,” Vanessa ordered. "We'll get you through."  
The wolf stayed with them long enough to clear the way. Cat looked back once and saw Jon in the mess by the gates. They were trying to get in all of Stannis men and fight off the White Walkers  
“Go to him!” Cat whispered to the wolf who threw herself back into the fray. Vanessa pulled her into the halls of Winterfell.  
“You know that wolf?”  
“It’s Nymeria. Vanessa?”  
“Yes?”  
The sounds were muted in here although the hall was quickly filling up with the wounded as well as the scared and hiding. Catelyn knew where she was going though and even though she was being helped she lead Vanessa to the steps on the far side of the room. Vanessa didn’t know how much longer the leg was going to hold up but she wasn't heavy. Catelyn looked at her with a smile as they made the steps, “I’m home,” was all she got out before passing out cold.

Peggy was one of the last ones through the gates. She had grabbed a sword from a fallen soldier and fought her way until it was only her, the wolves and a couple of the soldiers between them and the line of Walkers.  
They just kept coming through the trees. She tried to take a consideration of how many where on the field alone. Probably a thousand. More?  
Suddenly a horse careened between her and one that might have gotten the better of her if not for the intervention. Maege Mormont was staring down at her. She held out a hand with a smile, “Need a lift to the castle?”  
“Are we done?”  
“It’s a mess between us but between you and me we can manage…”  
Peggy wasn’t much better on horses than she was on dragons, especially not with a sword, but Maege managed to pull her up. She saw Stannis Baratheon was one of the last in the field. He waited until Maege had passed him, nodded at her, and then turned his horse.  
“Go!” Baratheon yelled. The horses were tired and straining against the creatures that tried to grab them. Not much had been left alive between the camp and the castle (and Peggy tried not to see some of the battlefield dead moving) though she couldn’t be sure of anything inside the castle, or anyone. She held on tight and did what she could. She looked back only once and didn’t want to again.  
They just kept coming.  
“Hold the gates!” Snow was yelling. They were so close but Peggy could feel the cold and knew the Walkers were as close on their heels as anything else.  
She could practically see his face and just from the look and the archers firing constant arrows from the walls she knew. Peggy saw a hand reach for her out of the corner of her eye and she thrust the sword taking it off.  
Hundreds of them were giving chase.  
Even if they made the castle she doubted they could hold it.

Only a few people inside of the castle actually saw the dragon appear. The sky had been so cloudy that for a minute to Jon that’s all it looked like. The clouds moving. Then the creature as big as Winterfell itself burst through them and with a roar began to light up the lines of the dead.  
The last of their men made it through, Stannis included. But the vision of the dragon was so awe-inspiring that Jon had to snap himself awake, “Close them! Get the gates down!”  
The woman who had arrived with Catelyn had jumped off a horse and ran over to him to watch the scene. The gates came down as fast as anyone could hope. Not that it mattered. The only thing out there was fire.  
“Well,” Peggy said. “I don’t know where she got to but as Howard would say she certainly has style.”  
Jon just gave her a weird look. This battle over and seemingly won he was suddenly too exhausted to wonder what the hell she was talking about. Ghost found him and nudged him. “You good boy?”  
The men were beginning to hail Stannis but it struck Jon when he had touched his wolf again that they had done it. Rather accidentally and desperately but they had done it nonetheless. He fell to his knees and wrapped his arms around Ghosts neck. “Look at us boy. We made it. We made it home.”


	31. Ice Castle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jon takes stock of what was lost and what remains at Winterfell.

A strange air settled over Winterfell after the battle. Not that they had any moments of peace as such to understand it. Jon had seen to Catelyn with the promise Melisandre could help her and, when he looked suitably worried, the promise that Vanessa would supervise Melisandre.  
He left Ghost with them for the time being.  
Back in the yard they were stacking the bodies. The dragon seemed to know what to do with the ones still outside the gate.  
The creature was having a wonderful time burning them up left and right. Jon stepped over Bolton’s body without care and went up the steps to take it all in. With the exception of the creature it seemed like the air itself was standing still.  
The fires crackled as they began inside the walls to do the same to the dead.   
Someone had been sent to see to Ramsay’s wild dogs whom were found not only to be feasting on Ramsay but many of the other Dreadfort men who had tried to escape. Jon tried not to think to hard on that one.  
Nymeria had disappeared back into the snow.  
Despite the raging fires a cold had settled. The snow had stopped but the air itself felt frozen. Everything was red and gray.  
He checked on Peggy who along with Maege was still seeing to the wounded, “How’s Cat?”  
Cat.  
Jon didn’t know either of these women but despite the strange stories they had told he liked them both. “I’ve been told she’ll be fine. You should take a break. Go upstairs and see her.”  
“I will as soon as I’m done here.”  
“There won’t be…”  
The injuries were bad as most of these battles were. He had seen a thousand men or more at this point fall. But Peggy didn’t seem to realize that or she hadn’t yet accepted most of these men would be in the fires soon enough. Jon forced a small smile to his face, “Let me know if you need anything.”  
“Will do.”  
The few prisoners Bolton had kept alive were being freed. Jon recognized only a handful of people but he had heard the original Winterfell prisoners had been marched off to the Dreadfort. He hoped they could hang on long enough to be freed.  
“My Lord!”  
“Is it true?” an exceedingly rotund man was yelling. He was dirty, bruised and bloody but not much worse for the wear. Many of the surviving Manderly men ran to him.   
“My Lord you live!”  
“Is it true? Have the wolves returned? No! No, do not fuss over me! Where is the She-Wolf?”  
Jon just smiled. He had never known the man well but he was glad the rumors of Wyman Manderly surviving the Bolton’s were true. He was glad the man lived. He’d leave Vanessa and Ghost to keep him from bothering Catelyn and put off dealing with him for the time being.  
On his second round he had found what was left of the spear wives. They were mourning over Mance and their fallen friends. And while they didn’t speak they looked at him with haunted eyes. Ramsay had not been kind. He flinched under their gazes and their obvious wounds.  
“I’m sorry,” he swore. “I’m sorry.”  
They left him then and he knelt down next to Mance. Jon closed his eyes. He had sent the Wilding into Winterfell. He had promised him that he would protect his son if he saved his sister and all along it hadn’t even been his sister. “You’re son is safe…”  
He thought of the wall like a knife through the heart. He imagined his son was safe. He had not yet had the courage to tell Gilly…  
All that was lost at the Wall.  
“I’m sorry.”  
Jon sat there with him until they came to take him to the fires. Time ticked away. He went back up to the walls watching the other fires, watching them die down, watching the stillness.  
One of the Baratheon men came to tell him that Lady Catelyn was resting comfortably and Stannis wanted to see him as soon as possible. “What shall I tell him?”  
“Tell him that he should rest. I’ll see him in the morning.”  
The soldier didn’t look all too thrilled to be the one relaying that message but indeed the light was dying and Jon imagined many exhausted people would be falling wherever they could drop. “You could always pretend you never saw me.”  
That made the young man smile.  
Jon had just turned back when the dragon flew overhead. Every person still out in this cold turned and watched the creature perch on the highest of the towers over Winterfell. It didn’t roar. It didn’t make a sound. Jon admired its beauty when the wolves began to howl. This time it wasn’t a howl of warning.  
The air filled with the sound of the wolves from all around Winterfell and the Ice Dragon called back to them. But as that beautiful sound had died down Jon was the first to hear another stranger sound…  
Ice.  
Creeping up the walls until the men started moving away from them. Creeping down from the towers. Jon wondered if the ice had come from the dragon but the way it took the castle he couldn’t even be sure of that much. It didn’t stop. Not until it covered Winterfell completely.


	32. Unsettling Thoughts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Catelyn dreams of her children and Howard is running out of excuses.

Ethan slammed down the glass sloshing the admittedly rather nice vodka everywhere but at least it finally got Howard to shut up. “Do you have any idea how much I want to kill you right now?”  
Howard just stared at him.  
“And I could do it. You have no idea the ways in which I could do it.”  
“I don’t understand what the problem is. So far they haven’t done anything untoward. They are as lost back there as we are. I might have screwed things up but apparently I’ve always screwed them up so this isn’t that bad.”  
“You’ve just come to that conclusion?”  
“Yes.” Stark thought about that for a minute more. “Yes, how in the world can a bunch of soldiers kill the Queen of Dragons? Whatever happened to cause this mess it most likely had nothing to do with what I did. We go back and get the girls. That’s what I’m thinking. According to the latest changes in the book and thank you again for having me keep track of all this or who knows what we would and wouldn’t remember…”  
Ethan collapsed in the leather chair. Howard was drunk. He had been drinking more and more the past couple of days although mostly when Jarvis wasn’t around as though the man had some sort of moral hold over him. Ethan didn’t have the time to think of any of the above. “And you take us home?”  
“Yes… probably…”  
Ethan gave him a glare.  
“Well, there is a little matter of what might you do with your timeline! I mean I suppose I could trust you not to go saving the Titanic or anything but other than that…”  
“I have no desire to do anything in my timeline at all thank you very much. The only part of this I even understand is that the future is full of mad men.”  
“Fine. Fine, I’ll reprogram our fate.”  
“What?”  
“The machine.”  
“That’s not what you said.”  
“It’s what I meant! Tomorrow morning. We’ll go through the door again. I got you to the wall last time. Hopefully I can get us within shooting distance of Winterfell without killing you."  
“I thought you said last time was blind luck?”  
“I’m a very lucky man.”  
“Tomorrow morning.”  
Howard nodded and waited for Ethan to finish his drink. He watched the strange man pass Jarvis on his way out of the lab. “We’re going to get them tomorrow! This will all be over then!”  
“Wonderful!” Jarvis, to his credit, kept the smile on his face until after Ethan was gone and the door closed behind him. “Have you figured out a way to meet the machine’s energy output since this morning?”  
“We’re going to Frankenstein it.”   
“Sir?”  
“Not the dead people obviously although there will probably be enough of those were we need to go… I’m going to not listen to you anymore. The town will only be dark for a couple of hours. And they’ll be a lull in the storm.” When Jarvis didn’t look happy or impressed Howard just rolled his eyes.  
“For the love of God man! I’m running out of options here!”  
“Not very Frankenstein, although I suppose they’ll come for me with pitchforks while I wait.”  
“That’s why I’m sending you and him.”  
“Sir?”  
Howard just smiled.   
“I must object. I think that’s an absolutely disastrous idea. What in the world am I supposed to do?”  
“You survived the war man.”  
“Not this kind of war.”  
“Peggy will be there to keep you safe. I need to be here to keep the machine running. If it goes down again…”  
“I’ll be stuck in the past?”  
“Try to think positively man.”  
“I’m positive that I’m going to be stuck in the past.”  
Howard patted his shoulder but they both knew Jarvis was done objecting to the new plan. The last time Ethan had come through Howard had made excuses about sending him back for the girls until he finally told Jarvis that the machine had lost the energy needed. “Help me cover. I get the impression I don’t want him to get upset.”  
“Sir?”  
Howard had been looking at him funny, “You know one of these days if I was to ever get my Artificial Intelligence working…”  
“Oh no.”  
“What?”  
“Don’t even think about making a computer out of me! Not when you we’re just talking about Frankenstein!”  
“You’re incredibly paranoid. You’d think I do crazy stuff like this all the time!”

It was the dreams that reminded her she was home. Brandon’s voice calling to her in the Godswood while she knelt in the snow. She felt as though she was really there even though they hadn’t let her venture outside yet.  
Her son’s voice.  
Rickon calling for her.  
“Why did you leave mommy?”  
“I’m back now love…”  
“Will you stay?”  
Arya in the wolf’s eyes.   
Sansa.  
She saw Sansa walking the halls of Winterfell and hurried to catch up to her. Catelyn twisted in her sleep. Sansa kept running further and faster away from her.   
“Sansa!”  
When she turned the last corner Sansa was finally looking at her but her face looked sad and she shook her head and backed away from her mother's open arms. Getting further and further away from her every step Cat took closer. A part of her knew this was a dream but she still wanted to scream in frustration.  
“Sansa…”  
Her face was older and there was a darkness in her eyes but it was her daughter nonetheless.   
“You’re home.”  
“I can’t.”  
“My girl!”  
“I can’t!” Sansa sobbed.   
“What’s wrong?”  
She had stepped so far back that Catelyn noticed the shadows growing around her. Suddenly one took shape and she flashed back to Renly’s tent only it was reaching for Sansa wrapping its arm around her.  
“Leave her alone!”  
The shadow actually seemed to turn to Catelyn and leer at her. The hand that wasn’t wrapped around her daughter’s waist was slinking around her neck and she could see the flash of a blade.  
“Sansa! Run!”  
“Do you forgive me?” her daughter cried.  
“Sansa!”

Catelyn bolted up in bed sweating and startled. This was her third night of bad dreams and this time at least she hadn’t woken her minder. Jon must have relieved Peggy at some point in time because he slept soundly with his head thrown back in a chair in front of the fires.  
Ghost however did come over to comfort her. The wolf rested its head on the edge of the bed while she gave him a scratch between the ears. Summer flashed into her mind covered in the blood of the assasin.  
Shaggydog.  
Grey Wind.  
Nymeria.  
Lady.  
So strongly that Catelyn almost pulled away startling him. “You know what I’m thinking about don’t you?”  
Ghost glanced up at her and Catelyn gave him another scratch and flung herself back to the bed. Being here, being home was finally messing with her mind. The walls she had erected were breaking down and she had to struggle not to cry herself to sleep but she failed at that as well. She had the horrible thought that now she was even failing to keep her children safe in her dreams. She would see them again she promised herself. She would see them all and beg for their forgiveness.


	33. Ghosts of Days Long Past

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stannis has unappreciated plans for Cat's future. Surprising refugees from the Riverlands arrive in Winterfell.

“Are you mad?”  
“Lady Stark, I’ll handle this.” But Jon backed down the minute she turned her gaze toward him. “Or you could…”  
Even Stannis flinched just a little when she looked back at him. He had presented himself in Ned’s solar although he didn’t dare take his seat. Catelyn had. That was until she heard Stannis ideas. “What do you object too Lady Stark? As King I will make sure any living children you may still have remain the heirs of Winterfell.”  
“Unbelievable.”  
“If your brother is dead perhaps I’ll even give you the Riverlands but the fact remains that in order to secure both rights you will have to remarry.”  
She fought the urge to slap him. It was literally right at the front of her mind. She imagined it would be such a nice thing but no… Stannis wouldn’t harm her but she didn’t want to make life any more difficult for Jon then was already the case.   
“You know that I’m right. You know it’s the best thing you can do for your children and your place.”  
“I can’t believe we’re all facing likely death here if not at the hands of the already dead then from starvation and hypothermia.”  
“What?”  
“Never mind.” They didn’t actually know what hypothermia was. She had stumbled over the word herself. Visions of Howard's library and another time danced in her head. “It’s still completely ridiculous that the first and only thing you can think of…”  
“It’s not the only.”  
“Was that a joke?”  
Stannis just glared at her.  
“I will not wed again.”  
“Who knows? Maybe you’ll want to.”  
“You’re not my King,” she told him softly. She wasn’t trying to be cruel but she was channeling a little of Vanessa’s theatrics in her stand. Catelyn knew that Vanessa could even throw the Red Woman off balance so she was doing it very purposefully. “You won’t ever be either.”  
“Is that a threat?”  
“No, it’s what’s I’ve seen in the flames…”  
Stannis turned from her to Jon, who could not offer any help regardless, and then after another minute huffed out of the room. Catelyn was grateful to see the back of him and fell back into Ned’s chair.  
It would always be Ned’s solar.  
Ned’s desk.   
Ned’s seat.  
Ned’s wife.  
“Are you well Lady Stark?”  
“Do you mean am I mad?”  
“You shouldn’t make him angry.”  
“How did you ever wind up mixed up with him Jon? I know what he did for you at the Wall but seriously? The man is maddening.”  
“It’s a long story.”  
“You’ve said that before.”  
“Yes, well…”   
She thought he might have been about to tell her something when the horns blared from the gates and even from this distance she could hear the commotion. Jon made it to the windows a lot faster than she could. “What?”  
“I can’t see anything from here. Wait here.”  
“Absolutely not!”  
Her heart skipped a beat. These were not horns for an attack so much as a warning or a declaration of visitors and Catelyn couldn’t help but think. She had to wonder… Was it possible? Was one of her children finally coming home to her?

“It’s not the Walkers,” Vanessa told Peggy as they fell into step beside one another. They had been keeping busy the last couple of days in the castle. Helping the injured. Counting supplies. Playing with the Ice Dragon. Though Vanessa had taken to the clothing and dresses a lot quicker than Peggy.  
“I assumed seeing as how no one’s screaming. It’s odd you know? I’m not even cold any longer.”  
Vanessa just smiled at that.   
“I think I may be so frozen that I’m past the point of cold.”  
“Or perhaps it’s Violet.”  
“Violet?”  
“Well, she didn’t hate the name and it’s better than anything the two of you have come up with!”  
Peggy turned her head and watched Violet circling. They hadn’t had any real attack recently though she got the feeling the dragon was burning most of the enemy on its hunts. She had to admit she felt better having the creature around. Though once her eyes left Violet they settled unpleasantly on another creature who was already on the walls.  
Melisandre, staring evenly at Vanessa. The way she was dressed had Peggy wondering how she wasn't freezing certain bits of herself off.  
“Don’t let her bother you.”  
“How did you know?”  
“She’s attempting to stare me down.”  
“How can she not bother you?”  
“She’s a performer. I’ve faced worse.”  
They were nearly last up the steps to the crowded walls. No one looked frightened any longer. Peggy and Vanessa walked over to Cat and Jon.  
“Who is it?”  
“About forty or fifty people,” Catelyn told her. “They’re staying too far out for anyone to see them. Could it be?”  
“I’m not sure. I don’t think more than ten men went through the gate." Peggy whispered. "Are they others?”  
“I don’t think so,” Jon overheard the whole conversation though Cat had been trying to keep it quiet.  
Cat could have sworn she saw something glinting in what little light there was. The dragon had gone ahead taken matters into her own hands and circled the group. “They certainly know to take cover. Bring them in. But Jon, tell whoever you send to be careful. There are a lot of things out there…”  
“No kidding.”  
“Not just dead things.”  
She exchanged a look with the others who followed her back down the stairs. Jon watched them going for a moment wondering what was really going on. He knew about Lady Stark’s dreams, he knew about Vanessa and the whispers that she might even be more powerful than the Red Woman. He wondered if Lady Stark and he were currently… No, Jon put the thought out of his mind. All that mattered was that they were both more alive than they had ever been. It was just death seemed so close.

No one was particularly happy to see the stragglers. “We came from the Riverlands…”  
“Here?”  
“Nowhere else to go…”  
They were herded into the castle half starved and mostly frozen. Jon noted most of them keeping an eye on the beast ignoring the men of the castle. At this point Jon could well mark the injured and those who wouldn't make it.  
“Winterfell still provides hope,” he heard one of them mutter.  
“Aye.”  
There was one man imparticular who drew his eye. Mostly because he was trying so hard to stay covered and down but yet when the dragon cried the man himself looked up startled and even through all the dirt and the muck and the years Jon Snow recognized him and found himself moving quickly sword drawn.  
A few people screamed as he pushed them out of the way but the man went down fast enough. Even prostrate on the ground the man couldn't hide the prideful look.  
“Sir?”  
Others had drawn their weapons.  
“He means you no harm!” a woman cried. “He saved my life! Him and his friends!”  
“Lord Snow?” one of the Wildlings asked nervously. He was holding back the young woman.  
“I command you put down your sword!” the young girl cried and a couple of the men around Jon laughed.  
“Get up.”  
“You going to kill me Snow?”  
“Get up Lannister.”  
“Put down your sword! This man is with me!”  
“You better listen to her Snow.”  
Rage rushed through him at the idea that Jaime Lannister broken and essentially doomed would command him anything. But Jon also knew that doing Jaime in know would be killing an unarmed defenseless man. Even if he was a Lannister he wasn't going to become that person.  
“Nice hand.”  
“Is that gold?” a Wilding cried.  
Jaime had the good sense to cover it up as he managed to stand. Broken yes, but still prideful. “Jon Snow, I bring you home your Queen.”  
“Excuse me?”  
“This is Jeyne Westerling. Well, Lady Stark not that you've ever had much cause for them. Your brother’s wife.”


End file.
